


Tell The Boys Where To Find My Body

by dear_monday, two_ravens



Category: Bandom, Fall Out Boy
Genre: Alternate Universe - 1950s, Alternate Universe - Assassins & Hitmen, Alternate Universe - Historical, M/M, contains less angst and more shenanigans than expected, the authors solemnly promise that this fic is more fun than the tags suggest
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-02
Updated: 2018-02-02
Packaged: 2019-03-08 14:50:31
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 44,768
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13460538
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dear_monday/pseuds/dear_monday, https://archiveofourown.org/users/two_ravens/pseuds/two_ravens
Summary: “Ours is not to reason why, Patrick,” Andrew said, philosophically. “That’s above our pay grade. He must be in some kind of shit, no one calls us unless they’re sure. Especially not for that kind of money.”New York City, 1958, and somebody wants Pete Wentz dead. Enter Patrick Stump and Andrew McMahon - musicians, small time criminals and occasional contract killers.





	Tell The Boys Where To Find My Body

**Author's Note:**

> **Contains some moderate violence and the on-screen death of one unnamed minor character.**  
> 
> This fic happened because there's a comic called Lady Killer by Joëlle Jones about a 50s housewife who also happens to be a contract killer, and her husband looks a lot like Andrew McMahon. We really love this story, and we hope you do too. For those of you who don't know who Andrew McMahon is, but would like to, we've made [a helpful primer](http://tw0-ravens.tumblr.com/post/170430094506/who-the-hell-is-andrew-mcmahon). For those of you who can't be bothered to read a primer, we recommend [this video](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FG0Q0mSEFwQ) instead, but no background knowledge is required for this fic.

“I’m too drunk for this,” said Patrick, examining the grisly thing on the table in front of him.  
  
“I thought you said you weren’t drunk _enough_ for this,” said Andrew. He was swaying slightly on his feet.  
  
“Both. I’m both. Too drunk. Not drunk enough. Andrew, what have we done?”  
  
“It’s beautiful. Look at it.”  
  
“I am looking at it.” It was making Patrick feel slightly nauseous. “Even for us, this is bad.”  
  
“It’s not that bad,” said Andrew.  
  
Patrick fixed him with a bleary, incredulous stare.  
  
Andrew wilted. “I don’t know where we went wrong,” he said, helplessly. “The instructions made it sound so easy.” They stared at it for a little while, Andrew with disappointment and Patrick with horrified fascination.  
  
“Well,” said Patrick, eventually. “We can’t eat it, unless you want a repeat performance of last time.”  
  
Last fall, when business had been slow and money had been tight, Andrew had had the bright idea that they should learn to cook. It wasn’t going well. The thing on the table (Perfection Salad, number eighteen in _McCall’s Great American Recipe Card_ _Collection_ ) resembled nothing so much as a mound of sad, damp vegetables entombed in murky, faintly apple-scented Jell-o, which was slowly collapsing under its own weight.  
  
“Oh, not so fast,” said Andrew. “It’s time for the moment of truth. Princess?”  
  
Andrew picked the thing up off the table and presented it to the extraordinarily large, ugly white cat who had materialized in the kitchen as if by magic. Patrick watched as Princess sniffed at it delicately, considering. The cat - fifteen pounds of muscle and attitude - would eat almost anything. Her verdict was the baseline for what was food and what wasn’t.  
  
Princess sniffed one more time, then turned and stalked away, her tail held high and her fur bristling.  
  
Andrew looked defeated. Patrick patted him on the shoulder and gingerly took the thing away from him, wary of the lake of sludgy, half-set Jell-o now slopping around on the plate. He opened the lid of the trash can, and it all slid off the plate with a sad squelching noise and disappeared.  
  
“Come on,” said Patrick, wiping his hands on a dishtowel. “The diner’s still open and I think Greta’s working tonight.”  
  
They were halfway out of the door, still buttoning coats and tugging at scarves and arguing good-naturedly, when the telephone rang. Andrew groaned and ducked back inside to answer it, leaving Patrick to wait in the hallway. He leant back against the wall, and his gaze fell on his own scuffed shoes. They’d been mended several times already, and they were letting the water in again. It had been a bad winter. If they didn’t solve their cash flow problem soon, they really would be in trouble.  
  
Andrew reappeared a minute later, and Patrick said, “Who was that? Walk and talk, I’m starving.” And then, because he still hadn’t moved, “Andy? Is everything alright?”  
  
“Oh, everything’s peachy,” said Andrew, who had started to smile. “We’ve got ourselves a job.”

 

*

 

Officially, Peter Wentz III was Andrew’s assignment, so he took the lead. He was sitting at a table in the corner of the bar with Wentz while Patrick sat at the piano, working his way steadily through every jazz and big band standard he could remember. A day or two of discreet investigation had revealed that one of Patrick and Andrew’s more useful contacts, himself a semi-legitimate businessman, was only one or two degrees of separation away from their mark. They’d had him set up a meeting, with Andrew posing as a potential investor and Patrick on hand for backup. Andrew had no head for numbers, but he was charming enough to pass himself off as almost anything - for a few hours, at least. With any luck, that would be all they needed.  
  
Patrick wasn’t quite close enough to eavesdrop effectively, but Andrew would give him a sign if he was in trouble. Andrew was unarmed, but Patrick had a gun in his jacket in case things went south. He studied them as he played. Wentz looked older than he had in the photograph Andrew had unearthed, maybe a little thinner, but it was definitely him. He laughed, loud and brash, and Patrick wondered what they were talking about. Wentz had been a soldier, Patrick remembered, and tried to picture him with a uniform and a regulation haircut. After the war, he’d returned home and started to rebuild the family business, which had been poised on the edge of bankruptcy. The client, who preferred to remain anonymous, had wanted him killed without arousing suspicion of foul play, and a substantial bonus would be awarded for useful information about the operation of the Wentz family firm. It was an unusually complicated job, one that would require a little finesse, and they’d altered their approach accordingly.  
  
Patrick struck the final, melancholy chord of Nature Boy and it hung in the air as he stretched, trying to work the stiffness out of his fingers. He was rusty. He and Andrew had a battered old upright piano back at home, but it had been a brutal winter and it always seemed like an extravagance to turn up the heat just so that he could play without his hands seizing up. Besides, it was forever out of tune. He ought to sing the next one, he thought. It wasn’t as if he was close enough to hear Andrew’s conversation with Wentz, so there was no reason not to. They’d be paid handsomely for this job, if they could pull it off, but they’d still need to eat until then, and tips were tips. He slid back into C major, and took a moment to line up the first verse of Luck Be A Lady in his head.  
  
And then he began to sing and Wentz looked up at him, his full attention falling on Patrick like a searchlight. Patrick could have kicked himself. He was supposed to be invisible, part of the furniture, not drawing attention to himself, and Wentz watching him with interest. Stupid, _stupid_. But the damage was done. He gritted his teeth and kept going.  
  
As Patrick finished the song, Andrew got to his feet, clapping Wentz on the shoulder on his way to the bar. Things seemed to be going well, at least. A moment later, Wentz stood up as well - and made his way towards the piano. Patrick’s relief curdled into dismay. This wasn’t supposed to happen. It was like a character from a television show stepping through the screen and starting a conversation. Up close, Wentz wasn’t an imposing figure, but there was something about him. He was short and compact, probably only an inch or two taller than Patrick, humming with barely suppressed energy. He had a big, bright Hollywood smile, sharp eyes, restless hands.  
  
“You’re good,” he said. “You ever think about making records? Voice like yours, you’d be famous.”  
  
Patrick laughed, surprised. It came out sounding meaner than he’d meant it to. “I’m not a singer,” he said.  
  
“No?” Wentz raised an eyebrow. “Ain’t that a bite. What are you, if you’re not a singer?”  
  
_Patrick Martin Stump. Small time crook and killer for hire, at your service_. “Patrick,” he said, thinking even as he said it that he probably should have given Wentz a fake name. Damn, damn, damn. “I’m Patrick.”  
  
“Pete Wentz.” He reached out to shake Patrick’s hand. Out of the corner of his eye, Patrick could see Andrew watching them.  
  
Patrick began to play again, picking out the slow, mournful tune of the St. James Infirmary blues. It was an old song, but it was one of his favorites, and he could play it with his eyes closed. “Nice to meet you, Mr. Wentz.”  
  
“Oh, please, call me Pete. Mr. Wentz is my father.” Pete grinned, like he knew exactly how he sounded and he was laughing at himself. Patrick caught himself smiling back before he got a hold of himself and wiped it off his face. “So, what else do you do, Patrick not-a-singer Stump?”  
  
_I’m a pretty good shot. Oh, and you should see what I can do with a knife._ “I mean, I play the piano,” Patrick said, uncomfortably. He could feel himself going red and hoped that Pete wouldn’t notice in the dim light. God, this was exactly why Andrew always did the face-to-face stuff. “Drums. Trumpet. Guitar. I flirted with the cello for a while but I sucked pretty bad.”  
  
“As bad as you suck at this?” said Pete, but he was still smiling. He leaned in towards Patrick, and Patrick smelled pomade and expensive cologne. “You’re a prodigy, aren’t you? You can tell me, I won’t let on.”  
  
“Well, I’m good with my hands,” muttered Patrick, still thinking about the things he could do with a knife, then groaned internally when he realized what he’d said. If Pete thought it had been flirtatious, there was a chance he’d take a swing at Patrick. If Patrick was lucky, Pete would get uncomfortable, make his excuses and walk away. But - no. Instead, Pete threw back his head and let out a startled bray of laughter. Well, thought Patrick. That was interesting.  
  
“I knew it,” said Pete. “Tell me, do you play here often?”  
  
“Sometimes,” said Patrick, without thinking, and regretted it immediately.  
  
Pete nodded, thoughtfully. “Well,” he said, “I’ll have to come back, won’t I? I’ll let you play, I should be getting back to my friend over there. It was nice to meet you, though, Patrick Stump. I’ll be seeing you.” He flashed Patrick another smile and turned away, picking his way back through the tables to where Andrew was waiting. Patrick let out a breath he hadn’t realized he’d been holding, and went back to the music.

 

*

 

At the end of the night, Patrick pulled his coat on over his white shirt and tugged his bow tie off as he stepped out of the back door and into the parking lot. Andrew had left on his own to avoid arousing suspicion, taking off in the wrong direction and doubling back on himself to meet Patrick on a corner a few blocks away. He was waiting when Patrick arrived, bundled up in his own enormous coat and scarf and rubbing his hands together to keep them warm. He’d been in New York for a long time and Boston for a while before that, but he was Californian by birth and the east coast winters didn’t agree with him. Together, they set off for the subway. It was a long way back to Brooklyn and the little apartment that they shared.  
  
“Change of plan,” said Andrew as they walked, moving in and out of the pools of light cast by the streetlamps. His eyes were shining. “I have an idea.”  
  
“No,” said Patrick, flatly, pulling his hat down low over his face. “No, you haven’t. I know you think you have an idea, and let me tell you, you absolutely don’t.”  
  
“ _Listen_ , I was thinking--”  
  
“No, you weren’t. You just thought you were thinking.” Patrick stuck his hands into his pockets and scowled. They were well into March, but the nights were still cold. It had rained earlier, leaving the air chilly and damp and the sidewalk slippery. “You thought wrong, Andrew. You thought very, very wrong.”  
  
Andrew waved his objections away impatiently as they crossed the street. “Come on. He was looking at you like he wanted to eat you alive. It’ll be a cakewalk.”  
  
“ _Andrew_ ,” hissed Patrick, looking around. The street was deserted but anyone could have been eavesdropping, and this was a dangerous conversation to be having out in the open.  
  
“You know it makes sense,” said Andrew, in an annoyingly reasonable voice. “Think about it. A honey trap.”  
  
“No,” said Patrick. “Absolutely not. Get bent, Andy. Honey traps are your department. You do it.” Andrew - who was tall, skinny and blonde - had a real gift for honey traps. Patrick - who was not as tall, or as skinny, or as blonde - lacked the people skills.  
  
“I don’t think I’m his type,” Andrew said, mildly. “Look, I saw it. The exact moment when I lost his attention. It was when you started singing.”  
  
“Do you have _any idea_ how risky that would be? What if we get caught? What if he doesn’t come back?”  
  
“He’ll come back.”  
  
“Well, alright, say he does. What are _you_ going to do, just disappear on him? Won’t he think that’s weird?”  
  
Andrew shrugged. “I’ll tell him I’ve changed my mind and I don’t want to invest. He’ll get over it. Fifty thousand dollars. Think about that, Patrick. That’s Steinway money. Think of the Steinway.”  
  
Patrick was making what Andrew called the Steinway Face, and he knew it. “Okay,” he said. “Okay. I’ll do it. But I want it on record that I don’t like this.”

 

*

 

It was a strange job, even by Andrew and Patrick’s standards. The anonymous client wasn’t so odd, they’d seen that before, and the request for information about Wentz’s business was pretty par for the course for industrial sabotage. The stipulation that they make it look accidental wasn’t unheard of, either, but it was curious that neither of them had heard Wentz’s name before. Usually their marks had been pissing people off for long enough that their names had gotten around by the time Patrick and Andrew were sent after them. It was the money, really, that was out of the ordinary. Even for such a tricky job, it was wildly generous. How a businessman who kept himself out of trouble and his dealings above board had wound up with such an extravagant price on his head, Patrick didn’t know.  
  
“Ours is not to reason why, Patrick,” Andrew had said, philosophically, when Patrick had mentioned it at dinner the night before. “That’s above our pay grade. He must be in some kind of shit, no one calls us unless they’re sure. Especially not for that kind of money.”  
  
He was right, of course. Patrick knew it made no difference, but he still wondered. He’d been watching Wentz closely, trying to figure out what on earth he could have done. That night, Patrick had traded the gun in his jacket for a smaller, less conspicuous knife, just in case. He didn’t like knives. He didn’t particularly like guns, either, but there was just something intimately horrible about a knife. Andrew, meanwhile, who had had something of a chequered history even back when he and Patrick had first met, always said that he just didn’t feel right without one in his pocket. He was fast, but he always liked to make sure he had the upper hand by bringing a knife to a fistfight wherever possible.  
  
But the knife in Patrick’s jacket that night was just insurance. He wasn’t expecting to need it. It was the third time Pete had shown up at the bar since his initial meeting with Andrew, and the third time he’d picked a table with a good view of the piano. Patrick had been playing for about half an hour when Pete got up and wandered over, his drink still in his hand, and leant over the piano, grinning.  
  
“Say I had a request of a… different nature,” he said, in a low voice, “Would you indulge me?”  
  
Patrick choked back a surprised laugh. He owed Andrew a dollar. Pete clearly didn’t waste any time. “I’m afraid I’m working just now,” he said. “Sir.”  
  
“Alright,” said Pete, unfazed. “How many drinks would I have to buy you for that not to be the case?”  
  
“More than you can afford,” said Patrick, and immediately wondered if he’d gone too far. This sort of thing didn’t come naturally to him. Either his efforts were so subtle as to be invisible to the naked eye, or he came on too strong and made people uncomfortable. In his defence, he didn’t get a lot of practice. Most of the flirting he did involved making significant eye contact across the bar, then walking out and hoping that the right guy followed him.  
  
Pete actually winked. “Are you sure about that? I’ve got deep pockets.”  
  
“Positive,” Patrick said. Testing a hunch, he said, “Now clear off, you’re ruining my ambience.”  
  
As he’d suspected, Pete didn’t go anywhere. “Sure,” he said. “As soon as you give me an answer. Now, about that drink--”  
  
“I get off at eleven,” said Patrick, smiling despite himself. “Stick around and you can buy me all the drinks you want.”

 

*

 

Patrick had been harboring the guilty hope that Pete would get bored and split, but when eleven o’clock rolled around, he was right there. Not only had he stuck around, he’d bought champagne.  
  
“Wow,” said Patrick, laughing as he took a seat at the table. “This is, uh…”  
  
Pete grinned. “Only fitting for an artist of your calibre?”  
  
“Apple butter, Mr. Wentz,” said Patrick severely, refusing to be taken in by Pete’s smooth talk. “No, I was going to say completely unnecessary, actually. I’m surprised you didn’t buy me roses.”  
  
Pete laughed and poured two glasses, handing one to Patrick. “I was going to send flowers to your dressing room, but the barman tells me you don’t have one.”  
  
Patrick had the distinct feeling that Pete wasn’t joking. He took the champagne and drank. He was thirsty, and it wouldn’t hurt him to loosen up a little. For heaven’s sake, he thought, this was ridiculous. All he had to do was ask Pete a few questions, flirt a little, get him talking. How hard could it be? Andrew did it all the time.  
  
“So,” Patrick said, leaning across the table and propping his chin on his hand. “You know all about me and I don’t know a thing about you. That hardly seems fair. What line of work are you in?”  
  
“Me? Oh, something thrilling and glamorous,” said Pete, very seriously, and then laughed. “If only, right? I could tell you, but it’s not that exciting. Nothing at all compared to the life of a jazzman like yourself.”  
  
You have no idea, Patrick thought, grimly. “Tell me,” he said. “Come on, you’ve piqued my interest now.”  
  
“There isn’t much to tell, really,” said Pete, and Patrick bit his tongue in frustration. “I’m in the import-export business, I inherited it from my father.”  
  
That much, at least, Patrick already knew. “Oh, really?” he said. “And what sort of, uh, importing and exporting do you do?” If Pete had taken over the family business and started making trouble, crossing the wrong people or poaching other companies’ customers, someone could well have decided to have him rubbed out. Not that Patrick thought Pete was about to admit it, if that was the case, but it was worth asking.  
  
“You ask a lot of questions,” said Pete. “You writing a book or something?” He was still smiling, but there was an edge to his voice.  
  
“No, no.” Patrick raised his hands. Goddamnit, he’d pushed too hard and put Wentz on his guard. That was exactly what he’d been trying to avoid. “Just curious, I guess, honest. I don’t get to meet people like you every day.” He tried to smile back. How the hell did Andrew do it? This was impossible.  
  
Pete relaxed, slightly, and Patrick drank some more. “So, your turn,” said Pete. “Where are you from? You’re not a native, that’s for sure.”  
  
“I’m not,” said Patrick, suddenly wishing he’d prepared a more convincing story. “I’ve moved around all over, really, but New York’s home, these days. I’ve been here a while.”  
  
“So what brings you to New York?” Pete asked. “The record labels?”  
  
Patrick laughed. “You got me,” he said. He tried not to dwell on it, but Pete was right. Decca, RCA and Columbia all operated out of Manhattan, along with most of the music publishers and several recording studios.  
  
“Anyway,” Pete said. “I just wondered--your accent. I’m from Chicago, I thought maybe I’d found a countryman.”  
  
“I love Chicago,” said Patrick, truthfully. He’d grown up there, and it was his favorite place in the world. Sometimes, he went for weeks at a time without thinking about it, but when he did, he missed it so much that he ached. “I lived out there for a few years when I was just a kid. I’d love to go back someday.” He didn’t think, somehow, that this was the moment to tell Pete why it would be a while yet before it was safe for him to go back home.  
  
Pete grinned. “Me too. Maybe when I retire I’ll buy myself a big old house to rattle around in, down by the water.”  
  
“No family, huh?” said Patrick. “No little ankle-biters to fill your shoes one day?”  
  
Pete cut his eyes at Patrick. “Don’t tell me you’re a reporter,” he said. “I’ve known a few in my time, and they’ve all been real bastards.”  
  
“No! Not a reporter, honest. But I, uh... don’t do this very often. Cut me some slack, alright? I’m trying.” He smiled sheepishly at Pete, who laughed.  
  
“Pretty face like yours, you don’t need to try,” said Pete, and winked. “See? I’ve just given you your headline.”  
  
It was such a magnificently brave, stupid thing to say that Patrick was truly lost for words for a moment. I could be anyone, he thought. A reporter. An undercover cop. A government spy. And here you are, telling me that you think I’m cute. After a while, he managed to say, “You cruising for a bruising, buddy? You know you could be locked up for what you’ve just told me.”  
  
“What can I say? I’m a romantic,” said Pete. He grinned. “Relax. I’m not courting jail time. Unless you’re going to rat me out, that is.”  
  
I’m going to do a whole lot worse to you than that before we’re through, Patrick thought.

 

*

 

When the bar closed and he and Pete went their separate ways, Patrick set out to meet Andrew at their favorite all-night diner. The sign outside said that the milkshakes were the best in New York City, which Patrick was pretty sure wasn’t true, but they’d been going for so long that to go anywhere else would have been unthinkable. Through the window, Patrick could see Andrew sitting at their usual table, trying to catch the eye of Greta the waitress. Greta had been working at the diner for almost three years, and Andrew still hadn’t convinced her to give him the time of day. Patrick pushed the door open and breathed in the wave of warm, fry-scented air. Greta waved to him as he went over to Andrew, and Patrick waved back.  
  
“How did you do?” Andrew said, as Patrick slid into the booth and sat down opposite him, the cracked candy-striped vinyl squeaking. “Did you get anything useful out of Wentz?”  
  
Patrick groaned. “I wish. I’m not cut out for this, Andrew, it should have been you.”  
  
“Maybe, maybe,” said Andrew, grinning. “But you’re the one he wants, so here we are.”  
  
That, at least, Patrick couldn’t deny. Pete had spent half the evening running his foot distractingly up and down Patrick’s leg under the table, making witty, urbane conversation while Patrick got more and more flustered. He was good company, sharp and quick to laugh, and he had a nice smile. The whole business left a bad taste in Patrick’s mouth.  
  
“Here we are,” he agreed, darkly.  
  
“Hey,” said Andrew, encouragingly. “It’s early days. Keep working on him. You just need him to trust you, it’ll be a cakewalk from there. Swear on my mother’s life.”  
  
“Andrew, your mother isn’t dead.”  
  
“You don’t know that.”  
  
“And neither do you!”  
  
“Well, no, but you have to admit that my point still stands.”  
  
Patrick made a dubious noise. He hadn’t thought it would be so difficult. He’d taken Pete for a guy who wouldn’t need much encouragement to talk about himself, but he’d seemed more interested than Patrick.  
  
“He bought you champagne,” Andrew reminded him. “That’s promising.”  
  
“That’s true,” admitted Patrick. He was still feeling a little bit light-headed. They’d made dinner at home earlier, and although the cream cheese frosted ribbon loaf hadn’t been as bad as the abominable Perfection Salad, he hadn’t eaten much. Pete had been delighted. “You’re a starving artist!” he’d said. “Suffering for your art. I love it.”  
  
Maybe it wouldn’t be so hard after all. “I can do it,” Patrick said, looking down at the tabletop. “I’m just--I’m used to being careful. I’m not good at this like you are.”  
  
“That’s the spirit,” said Andrew. “Come on, let’s order. I want a milkshake. Hey, Greta?”  
  
Greta came over, flipping her notepad open and taking a pencil from behind her ear. Andrew had asked her to go dancing, once, but she’d raised an eyebrow and blown a pink, perfect gum bubble and said, “Honey, I’ve got two left feet and not a lick of rhythm.” Andrew and Patrick - who had seen her dancing a mop across the floor and heard her singing to herself on more than one occasion - both knew it wasn’t true, but Andrew had accepted the rejection with good grace.  
  
“Hey, nosebleed,” she said to Andrew, who beamed up at her. God help him if she ever changed her mind, Patrick thought, she’d run rings around him. “Alright, what can I get you boys?”

 

*

 

“Andy?” Patrick called. He was lying on the floor in the living room, feeling around under the couch for loose change. “You got any dough for the laundromat? I’m ten cents short.”  
  
“I wish,” Andrew called back from the hallway. “Try under the coffee table.”  
  
“Already did.” Patrick got to his feet and dusted himself off. Maybe he’d have more luck in the kitchen. He’d been putting off the inevitable trip to the laundromat for days, and he was almost out of clean shirts - so far, the Wentz job had been hell on his limited wardrobe. When he stepped back out into the hallway, he found Andrew standing in front of the mirror in his good suit, fixing his hair. Patrick blinked.  
  
“Look at you, all dressed up,” he said. “Are you due in court?”  
  
“Very funny, wise guy. Do you not know what day it is?”  
  
Patrick tried to remember. It wasn’t as if the day of the week normally had any bearing on what he did with his time, so he tended to lose track. “Wednesday?” he said, eventually, when it became apparent that Andrew was still waiting for an answer.  
  
“ _Ash_ wednesday, you heathen,” said Andrew, and suddenly it made sense.  
  
“I always forget that you’re a Catholic,” said Patrick. “It’s all the…” he made a vague gesture that encompassed Andrew’s entire being. Andrew in his sunday best was always an unsettling sight. Under normal circumstances, he could make even a tuxedo look vaguely disreputable, but on holy days, with his hair neatly parted on the side and his smart shoes on, he looked like the kind of boy any girl would take home to meet her mother.  
  
Andrew grinned. “Don’t wait up,” he said, and turned to leave.

 

*

 

Andrew came home a few hours later with a smudged cross drawn in ash on his forehead. Patrick had managed to scare up another ten cents, and the apartment was full of the smell of clean clothes.  
  
“How was it?”  
  
Andrew shrugged. “Just like last year, really. It doesn’t change.”  
  
“Do you feel holy?”  
  
Andrew grinned, and looked a little bit more like his normal self. “Do I ever?”  
  
“I don’t know why you bother going.”  
  
“I’m hedging my bets,” said Andrew, as he shrugged off his overcoat and wandered into the kitchen, and Patrick shook his head.  
  
“So, that’s your churchgoing done for the year, is it?”  
  
“Until Easter, yeah.” Andrew lit a Lucky Strike and exhaled a thin curl of smoke. He was the only man Patrick had ever met who smoked Luckies, but there was method in it. He’d pat down his pockets, making a big show of not having a lighter, and ask a pretty girl whether she’d be so kind as to lend him hers. He’d pull out the pack of Luckies, and she’d laugh at him for smoking ladies’ cigarettes, and he’d do his ‘Aw, shucks,’ routine, and before she knew it he’d be buying her a drink. “I can’t be going to church every week,” he said. “I don’t have the damn time.”  
  
Patrick laughed. “You’re the worst Catholic I know.”  
  
“Oh, please.” Andrew gestured dismissively with his cigarette, leaving a swooping trail of smoke in the wake of his hand. “Everybody knows that you feel like a bad Catholic no matter what you do so you might as well live.”  
  
“Well, sure, but you’re even worse than me.” Patrick paused. “Huh. That’s a thinker, actually. Are you, or am I?”  
  
Andrew opened his mouth, looking indignant, then closed it again. “I don’t know,” he said, grudgingly, after a minute.  
  
“Yeah, me neither. We’d have to ask a priest. A _real_ priest,” Patrick added, looking pointedly at Andrew.  
  
“I could have been a priest.”  
  
“You _dressed_ as a priest once,” Patrick reminded him. “As part of a scam.”  
  
“And it worked, didn’t it?”  
  
“Well, sure, but--”  
  
At that moment, the telephone rang, putting a stop to the worn-in bickering. Andrew went out into the living room to pick it up, not bothering to put out his cigarette.  
  
“Hello?” he said, picking up the receiver. The telephone was a hideous banana-yellow thing that Andrew had seen in a store and taken an inexplicable shine to, and it had stuck around despite several attempts on Patrick’s part to sabotage it. Andrew tipped his head to one side and exhaled smoke as he listened. “Mhm. Yeah, he’s here. It’s for you, Patrick.”  
  
He handed over the phone and Patrick took it, wondering who on earth it could be. Nobody ever called specifically for him. Clients treated him and Andrew as a single two-headed creature, and consequently didn’t seem to care much which one of them they spoke to. “Hello?” he said, cautiously.  
  
“Patrick! It’s been a whole lot of trouble, getting hold of you, but you’re worth it.”  
  
Even if Patrick hadn’t recognised the voice - and he did, almost at once - the words would have been enough to tip him off. “ _Pete?_ ” he said, incredulously. He was vaguely aware that he was doing this all wrong. What he should have said was something smooth and flirtatious, like he’d been expecting Pete to call. What he actually said was, “I didn’t… how did you get this number?”  
  
“Travis the bartender had it.”  
  
“And he gave it to you.” Patrick was going to kill him.  
  
“Well. Once I’d given him five bucks, yes.”  
  
Andrew was mouthing _what does he want?_ \- complete with illustrative hand gestures, like they were playing charades. Patrick made an illustrative hand gesture of his own.  
  
“Not that it’s not nice to hear from you,” he said, trying to collect his thoughts. “Just a… surprise, that’s all. You miss me?”  
  
Andrew batted his eyelashes and pouted like a movie starlet. Patrick pointedly turned his back on him and looked out of the window instead.  
  
At the end of the phone line, Pete laughed. “You got me. Actually, I was going to ask you whether you’ve got plans for dinner tonight. There’s a little place called the Hickory House over on West 52nd, I thought I’d take you there. You’ll like it.”  
  
Patrick was sure he would, but that wasn’t the problem. His misgivings had more to do with being out in public with Pete. The more often they were seen together, the sooner the cops would come knocking once Pete was dead. Not that he’d need to be dead for the cops to take an interest, of course - if they weren’t careful, if someone didn’t like the way they looked at each other, they could both be arrested. It was all so hellishly complicated. Not for the first time, Patrick wondered why he’d let Andrew talk him into this ridiculous scheme.  
  
“I don’t know,” Patrick said, slowly. He closed his eyes for a moment, choosing his words very carefully. After a moment, he settled on, “Will we be… safe?”  
  
“Safe?” Pete said. His voice was flattened out by the phone line, but Patrick could picture his wide-eyed expression perfectly. “Why on earth wouldn’t we be? We’re just two old friends catching up over a meal and a couple of drinks. What’s wrong with that?”  
  
He had a point there, at least. As long as Pete could keep his hands to himself, they’d probably be alright. That didn’t mean Patrick had to like it.  
  
“You sound awfully sure of yourself,” he said, toying with the telephone wire and trying to ignore the feeling of Andrew’s eyes burning a hole in his back. “What’s in it for me?”  
  
“Good food?” said Pete. “Good company?” Patrick could just see him, grinning, leaning back in his chair, his patent shoes propped up on his desk. “Hell of a house band, too. I think even you’d be impressed.”  
  
There was an unpleasant sensation stealing over Patrick, and it was the feeling of being known. It sounded perfect. In another life - one where he really had been nothing but a dime-a-dozen bar pianist - he would have jumped at the chance. “Well, alright,” he said, and he could hear the smile creeping into his own voice. “You’ve convinced me.”  
  
“Great. Travis gave me your address, I’ll come by and pick you up at seven. I’ll see you later, doll.”  
  
Patrick opened his mouth to protest the pet name, but Pete had already hung up. Patrick slammed the phone down with slightly more force than was strictly necessary, and let out a long breath.  
  
“Well?” said Andrew, clearly unable to keep quiet for another second, and Patrick groaned.  
  
“He’s taking me out for dinner tonight. God. I know how this sounds,” said Patrick, rubbing his temples. “Coming from me, I mean. But this… fast and loose attitude he has to the law is a problem. He’s going to land us both in prison.” Maybe that was what having money did for you, he thought, only slightly bitterly.  
  
“Hey.” Andrew pointed at Patrick accusingly with his cigarette. “That’s not the deal, remember?”  
  
The deal was an agreement they’d made not to allow their subsidiary criminal pursuits to get in the way of business - in other words, no jail time for anything short of murder. Patrick groaned, dropping his head into his hands. “I _know_ ,” he said. “Believe me, I’m not happy about it either. But what am I supposed to do?”  
  
“Act shy,” Andrew suggested. “You know--” he tossed his head and affected a Scarlett O’Hara drawl. “--Oh my, sir, I couldn’t let you take my arm in public! Why, I reckon I’d be blushin’ fit to burst!”  
  
“Shy,” repeated Patrick, ignoring Andrew’s southern belle act. It was an unsettling sight, especially when you’d watched him dispose of a dead body. “Alright. I can… I can do shy.”

 

*

 

Pete hadn’t been wrong about the house band, Patrick thought, as he watched them play. Their version of I Got Rhythm was one of the tightest he’d ever heard. He didn’t know who to watch, the drummer holding an eight piece band together like it was nothing or the brass section who played like they could read each other’s minds - or Pete.  
  
True to his word, Pete had had a cab waiting outside Patrick and Andrew’s building at seven o’clock sharp. He’d looked as if he’d come straight from the office, and Patrick had suddenly wondered whether he should have changed his own clothes. “You’re putting me to shame,” Patrick had said, and Pete had laughed and said, very seriously, “Never.” It looked like he’d meant it, too. They were waiting for their food to arrive and listening to the band, but Patrick kept on catching Pete looking at him instead. Every time their eyes met, Patrick felt a sharp jolt of mingled exhilaration and apprehension, like they’d robbed a bank together and it was still too soon to say whether they’d gotten away with it. Pete was a heart attack that never stopped and Patrick felt like a teenager again, half sick with nervous excitement at the thought that he could be looking at a boy and the boy could be looking back.  
  
Pete reached across the table and his fingertips brushed Patrick’s wrist, and Patrick jumped like he’d touched a live wire. The stolen glances were one thing, but this wasn’t--did Pete not know what kind of danger he was putting them in? People - men - didn’t touch like that. No one, in fact, had ever touched Patrick like that, but the world hadn’t ended, no one had noticed, the cops weren’t kicking down the door. Patrick could feel his heart pounding. He wanted Pete to do it again.  
  
“I’m not keeping you, am I?” said Pete. “There’s no missus waiting for you at home?”  
  
Patrick had a sudden vision of Andrew waiting up in a dressing gown with curlers in his hair and an irate Princess in his arms, and stifled a slightly hysterical laugh.  
  
“Or maybe a mister?” said Pete, evidently misinterpreting the look on Patrick’s face.  
  
“No, no,” he said. “There’s no one waiting for me.”

 

*

 

The apartment was dark and cold when Patrick got home. He followed the smell of whiskey to the living room, where he found Andrew sprawled on the couch, fast asleep, the empty bottle lying on its side on the floor. Patrick took the afghan from where it had been left draped over the back of a chair and spread it over Andrew, who woke with a start, his hand shooting out to grab Patrick’s wrist.  
  
“Only me, buddy,” Patrick whispered, and Andrew let go of his arm.  
  
Andrew sat up, rubbing his eyes. “Sorry,” he said, hoarsely. “I was going to wait up.” He moved over, offering Patrick the other end of the couch.  
  
“Don’t worry about it,” said Patrick. “It’s late.” They sat there for a moment in the dark and the quiet. Patrick picked up the empty bottle and set it on the coffee table. “I see you had yourself a little party while I was gone.”  
  
“Some party,” said Andrew, with a short laugh. “I feel like hell. Drinking to forget’s no fun anymore once you hit thirty. What time’s it?”  
  
“A little after one. Did you eat today?”  
  
Andrew hesitated. “Yes.”  
  
“You’re a goddamn liar, McMahon. Come on.” Patrick nudged Andrew off the couch and led him into the kitchen. He turned on the light and Andrew groaned, raising one hand to shield his eyes. Patrick fiddled with the temperamental stove and started slicing bread for grilled cheese while Andrew took a seat at the table, still wrapped in the blanket.  
  
“How did it go?” asked Andrew, around a yawn.  
  
Patrick took the last of the cheese from the refrigerator and examined it, wondering if it was still good to eat and trying to remember how long it had been in there. “Fine,” he said, absently. “Or--I don’t know. I think it was fine. I think he likes me, at least. He just won’t tell me anything I can use.” He set the skillet on the stove top to heat up and reached for the butter, frowning. “I didn’t think it’d be so goddamn difficult to get him to talk about himself. He keeps on asking _me_ things.”  
  
“Oldest trick in the book,” said Andrew, knowledgeably, his voice still thick and sleepy. “He try to get fresh with you in the cab on the way home?”  
  
“No,” said Patrick, grudgingly. He’d been flirting as obviously as he dared to and he’d been so sure that it was working, so sure that Pete would finally snap, but he hadn’t even tried to kiss Patrick goodnight. He’d been a perfect gentleman. It was maddening. “He’s… not what I was expecting.”  
  
Andrew let out a short, tired little laugh. “No?”  
  
“No.” Pete was a perpetual motion machine, always tapping his feet and his fingers, never still. Patrick stretched for words, some way of explaining him. He was like a loose tooth that Patrick couldn’t leave alone. He flipped the grilled cheese over and the butter hissed gently in the hot pan, the sound and the smell filling the kitchen. “He’s sharp. On the stick, you know? He’s not easy to keep up with, but it’s worth the trouble. I think he’s lonely.”  
  
Andrew made a face. “Aren’t we all,” he said. “I’m going to stop you there. It’s not that I’m not interested, you understand, but I’d rather not know.”  
  
“Of course. Sorry, I’m… not used to being on this side of things.” Patrick slid the grilled cheese out of the skillet and onto a plate. It was perfect, the cheese just bubbling out at the edges and the bread gone crispy and golden. He set the plate down in front of Andrew, and sat down opposite him. Andrew took a bite, and gave Patrick a familiar, crooked smile.  
  
“You’re my best girl, you know that?” he said. “I’m a lucky man.”  
  
Patrick rolled his eyes, but he was smiling, too. “Eat up. It’s time you went to bed.”

 

*

 

Despite the promising signs, things still weren’t progressing as quickly as Patrick would have liked. On the face of it, certainly, the signs were there - the things Pete said, the way he was forever finding reasons to put his hands on Patrick, the way he kept on looking at Patrick’s mouth. But he was still holding out, and Patrick was no closer to understanding the inner workings of his business. He hadn’t even been able to find out who the other key players in the company were, or who they dealt with, or what kind of money they were making.  
  
“I just don’t _understand_ ,” he moaned. He was lying facedown on the living room couch. “Sure, he acts like he’s interested, but I’m doing everything I can and he won’t even kiss me, let alone--anything else. And he won’t tell me a damn thing. What’s the deal?”  
  
“Maybe he really likes you,” said Andrew, from the piano stool. “Maybe he just wants to get to know you. Maybe he’s after more than just a quick fuck.”  
  
Patrick sat up and looked at Andrew for a moment, feeling like he’d stalled. He hadn’t thought of that. In his experience, if someone liked the look of him enough to want him, they went with him to a bathroom or an alley or a motel room, and then the two of them went their separate ways afterwards. “I don’t know,” he said slowly. “I don’t think... it’s different, for me. It’s not like it is for you.”  
  
Andrew suddenly looked terribly sad, and Patrick felt inexplicably annoyed. “What?” he demanded. “Andrew, _what?_ That’s just the way it is.” Patrick had made his peace with it a long time ago - as far as he was concerned, being queer was hardly the worst of his sins, but the law had other ideas. He sighed. “I don’t know what I’m doing wrong.”  
  
“Well,” said Andrew. “If you want my advice--”  
  
“I don’t,” said Patrick.  
  
“--You just need to get him into bed. It’s going to make your job a whole lot easier.” Andrew picked out a few notes of something slow and sexy on the piano, which was somewhat spoilt by the fact that it needed tuning again.  
  
“Oh my god,” Patrick said. “No. Absolutely not. We’re not having this conversation.”  
  
Andrew shrugged. “Alright,” he said. “But that’s what I’d do.”  
  
“But _how?_ ” said Patrick, despairingly. It was alright for Andrew. Patrick had seen him in action, and he barely had to smoulder at a mark’s bored, disaffected wife from across the bar before they were booking a room for Mr. and Mrs. Smith in the motel across the street. And he didn’t have to worry about being arrested while he was doing it, either. “I’ve done just about everything I can think of, short of showing up naked at his door, for heaven’s sake. Maybe he’s changed his mind and he just doesn’t know how to let me down easy.”  
  
“Horseshit,” said Andrew, mildly. “Come on, Patrick, you know that’s not true. Maybe he’s just taking things slow.”  
  
“Oh, what, are you going to sit him down with a cigar and a glass of scotch so you can ask him about his intentions?” snapped Patrick. The frustration was starting to get to him. He pitched a decorative throw pillow at Andrew’s highly punchable face and felt slightly better.  
  
“I might,” said Andrew, seriously. “You’ve got to be careful, Patrick, these boys are only after one thing. I’m just looking out for you.”  
  
“I’m going to knife you while you sleep,” Patrick promised him, and sighed. It would have been so much easier if Pete really was only after one thing. “Alright, alright, let’s hear it. What do I do?”

 

*

 

“So, listen,” said Patrick, abruptly. He was playing at the bar again, and Pete was hanging around flirting shamelessly and making a nuisance of himself as usual. Patrick had played this conversation out a hundred times in his mind and it was awkward and embarrassing whichever way he spun it. The best thing for it, he’d decided, was just to get it over with. Andrew had told him to stop playing coy and make a goddamn move, damn the torpedoes, so here he was. “This Friday. We’re going out. Meet me here at eight. Don’t wear a tie.”  
  
There. He’d done it. Andrew would have done a better job of it, no doubt - he would have sounded smooth and inviting, not like he could barely string a sentence together - but Andrew wasn’t there to judge him.  
  
“Aren’t you bossy,” said Pete, but he was grinning. He seemed bizarrely determined to be charmed by everything Patrick did. Patrick had given up on trying to understand it. “Friday, huh? Where are we going?”  
  
Patrick suddenly found that he couldn’t seem to say the words _I want to take you dancing_. Of all the times to come over all shy, he thought, exasperated with himself. He’d done the difficult part, this should have been easy. “It’s a surprise,” he said, shiftily. “You’ll have to wait and see.”

 

*

 

Friday came around all too soon, and Patrick spent the whole day feeling twitchy and irritable, watching the clock and snapping at Andrew without the slightest provocation. Andrew had even cooked - he’d made meatloaf, which for some reason was one of the only edible things he could reliably produce - but Patrick had sat there pushing it around his plate, unable to eat.  
  
Andrew was in the living room with his feet up on the coffee table and Princess draped over his shoulders like a large and remarkably ugly fur stole, purring like an engine. He looked Patrick over and said, “Are you leaving? You should call your old man before you go out.”  
  
“My-- _what?_ Why?”  
  
“Because he might want his shirt back. Patrick, look,” said Andrew, not unkindly. “Your clothes are ten years out of date.”  
  
Patrick looked down at himself. “I like them that way.”  
  
“It’s a honey trap. It’s not about what _you_ like.”  
  
“Pete liked me fine at the bar,” said Patrick, rebelliously.  
  
“You were in a tie and tails at the bar,” Andrew said. “What’s he going to say when you show up there in this get-up? Your jacket’s more patch than jacket. Come on.” Carefully, he dislodged Princess and set her down on the couch, ignoring her furious hissing, and got to his feet.  
  
“I don’t see the point of all this,” said Patrick, as Andrew dragged him down the hallway and into his bedroom. “If everything goes to plan I’m only going to end up taking it off anyway.”  
  
Andrew heaved a martyred sigh and threw open his own closet. “You’re missing the point. You’ve got no… no _romance_ in your soul, Patrick. It’s like opening a present, the unwrapping is half the fun. Take your clothes off, we’ve got a lot of work to do.”  
  
“I sincerely hope that’s not how you talk to women,” said Patrick, resignedly unbuttoning his shirt.  
  
“Of course not,” said Andrew, absently. He was comparing two pairs of socks. “I am a perfect gentleman.” He tossed one pair to Patrick. “Hold these.”  
  
“Andrew,” said Patrick, examining the socks. “These are cashmere. They must have cost, what, two bucks?”  
  
Andrew grinned over his shoulder. “Courtesy of Mr. Bloomingdale.”  
  
“You’re going to get caught one of these days,” said Patrick, without much conviction. While Patrick had been locked up in Chicago, Andrew had been doing some time of his own for larceny in Boston. His sleight of hand was legendary, and it was only thanks to a piece of catastrophically bad luck that he’d been caught at all. Light-fingered and effortlessly charming, he was much better suited to this honey trap nonsense than Patrick.  
  
“Maybe,” said Andrew, “Maybe not. Let’s talk about jackets.”

 

*

 

Andrew looked Patrick up and down, critically. “Well,” he said. “I wouldn’t kick you out of bed. Are you sure you won’t let me grease your hair?”  
  
“ _No_ ,” said Patrick, emphatically. He’d worn pomade once, and he’d been sixteen and it had taken him an hour and a half to wash it out again. It hadn’t been a success. He stood in front of the mirror, twisting around to examine his reflection from all angles. “I can’t fit a gun in these pants,” he grumbled.  
  
“You won’t need to,” said Andrew. “Stop bitching, you look fine. Now go, don’t keep your man waiting.” He raised one hand like he was about to give Patrick a playful slap on the ass, then saw the look on Patrick’s face and appeared to think better of it.  
  
“I hate you,” Patrick said, as he made his way back down the hallway, wincing. How did people wear pants this tight all the time? Was it something you just had to get used to?  
  
“You’re welcome,” said Andrew, cheerfully, following behind him. “You’ve got a knife on you, right? You know what to do if he goes for your tits.”  
  
Patrick pulled his coat on and jammed his hat down over his head, then threw open the door. He turned back to glance over his shoulder at Andrew’s smug face. “Fuck you, Andrew,” he said, and slammed the door behind him.

 

*

 

Andrew’s intervention had slowed Patrick down, and he was running late. Pete was waiting when he arrived, sitting at the bar and making easy small talk with Travis the bartender. When he saw Patrick, his face lit up and he hopped down off his barstool, leaving his drink half finished. He looked Patrick up and down - a long, slow look that made Patrick feel hot all over. “Hel- _lo_ ,” he said. “Look at you, all chrome-plated.”  
  
Patrick still felt ridiculous in the stupid tight shirt and the stupid pants that clung to his ass, but he was glad Andrew’s ministrations were having the desired effect on Pete, who was still looking him over with hungry eyes. Patrick thought about Pete undressing him, Pete’s hands all over his body, and he swallowed. Get a hold of yourself, he thought, furiously. Maybe Andrew was right - maybe he really did just need to get Pete into bed. Patrick was trying not to stare, but it was difficult. Pete’s hair was slicked back and his shirt was open at the collar, his smile wide and easy.  
  
“You’re looking pretty sharp yourself,” said Patrick, who had given up on not staring and was just trying not to stare too obviously. “I’m sorry I’m late. I didn’t keep you waiting too long, did I?”  
  
“Oh, no, it was worth the wait.” Pete’s eyes were sparkling with mischief and Patrick willed himself not to blush. Goddamnit, Patrick just needed him to hit one wrong note for the spell to be broken. “Shall we?”  
  
Together, they walked back out into the cool of the evening. It was a clear night, the city lights washing out the stars.  
  
“Alright,” said Patrick. “If we walk a couple of blocks down there’s a better place to catch a cab--”  
  
“No need.” Pete grinned, and held up a set of keys. “I brought the car.”  
  
He led Patrick around the back of the bar to the parking lot and over to the most outrageous car Patrick had ever seen. It looked out of place, somehow not quite real, like something clipped out of a magazine and pasted into the real world. Patrick didn’t know much about cars, but he thought it was a Cadillac, a beast of a thing with lots of shiny chrome and a glossy, cherry red paint job.  
  
“This is yours?” said Patrick, laughing, although he didn’t know why he was so surprised. It was big and loud and larger than life in just the same way Pete was.  
  
Pete beamed and patted the hood. “Yeah. She’s my best girl.” He opened Patrick’s door for him and walked around to climb into the driver’s seat. The interior was butter-soft leather, the color of vanilla ice cream. Pete loved this car, Patrick realized - and, sitting in the front seat with the engine growling, Patrick sort of thought he could understand why.  
  
Pete looked over at Patrick, still grinning, one hand on the steering wheel. “Where to?”

 

*

 

“This is the place?” said Pete, peering out of the window. “You’re sure?”  
  
“Positive. I know it doesn’t look like much from the outside.” Patrick opened the car door and grinned over his shoulder at Pete. “Do you trust me?”  
  
Pete laughed, and climbed out of the car. Patrick led him over to the run-down old building on the other side of the street.  
  
“Patrick,” said Pete, conversationally. “Correct me if I’m wrong, but this looks like a funeral home. Is this your way of telling me you’re planning to bump me off for my money?”  
  
Patrick’s stomach lurched, and he covered it with a laugh. Not for _your_ money, he thought. He pushed open the door, and the man sitting behind the counter looked up.  
  
“Patrick,” he said, getting to his feet. “I was so sorry to hear about your uncle.”  
  
Patrick nodded and shook his hand. “Hell of a way to go,” he said. It meant _it’s okay, I’m here with a friend_.  
  
Ryland’s expression didn’t flicker. “Of course,” he said, gravely. “Go right on through, I’m sure you’d like to pay your respects.”  
  
He opened the door to the back room and held it for them, winking at Patrick over Pete’s shoulder, and Patrick resisted the urge to roll his eyes. Pete glanced at Patrick, who nodded, and they stepped through. Patrick tipped his hat to Ryland, and he closed the door again behind them. It was dark, and Patrick felt around for the light switch. After a moment, he found it and the bulb hummed to life. They were in a small chapel of rest, a low table in the middle and vases of flowers dotted tastefully around. Pete looked mystified, but he allowed Patrick to lead him over to the far side of the room. It was a door that didn’t look like a door, and you had to know exactly where to push to get it open. He tapped his knuckles against it a couple of times, looking for the spot that sounded hollow.  
  
“Aha,” he muttered. “There you are.” He shouldered the door open, revealing a flight of stairs that led down into the basement. Music was filtering up from down below, and when Patrick looked back over his shoulder, Pete had started to smile. Patrick took his hand and grinned back at him. “Let’s go.”  
  
Pete followed him down the steps, wide-eyed.  
  
It wasn’t much, just a small, smoky room, dimly lit, with a bar at one end and a rock and roll band on a little stage. It had been a speakeasy, back in the twenties, and something of the atmosphere still lingered. It was an awful dive, but the music was fast and loud and Patrick loved it. Pete was wide-eyed, all lit up like a Christmas tree, and Patrick knew he’d got it right.  
  
“Holy _shit_ ,” breathed Pete, looking around and laughing. “How did you even find out about this place?”  
  
Patrick laughed. “I got a call a few years ago from the bandleader here. Their regular trumpet player was in the hospital, they needed a pinch hitter. Promised me fifteen bucks for a night’s work if I’d come and play without ratting them out to the cops afterwards.”  
  
At the time, Patrick had assumed that the secrecy was necessary because the club was operating without a cabaret license and had thought no more of it - after all, they wouldn’t have been the only ones. It wasn’t until he’d been up on the stage that night and he’d looked out into the crowd and noticed the dancing couples - men and men, women and women - that the penny had dropped. They’d called again a few times over the years when their house band had been down a player. Once, they’d needed both a pianist and a drummer and Patrick had, against his better judgement, been forced to bring Andrew with him. Patrick had stopped him just outside the door with a hand on his arm and said, “Now, what did we talk about? Say it with me,” and Andrew had recited, meekly, “I am not as irresistible as I think I am, and I will leave the girls alone.”  
  
Patrick knew a lot of people at the club - band and bar staff and regulars and some who were all three - and as they picked their way through the mismatched tables, several people stopped him to say hello. Kitty shrieked when she saw him and pulled him close to plant a kiss on his cheek. He played along, acting shy and making like he was blushing, and she laughed.  
  
“Kitty,” he said, wiping the smudge of lipstick off his face and grinning. “It’s been a while, huh? Is Lindsey with you?”  
  
“At the bar. Make sure you talk to her before you split, she’ll be heartbroken if she misses you. You never come and see us anymore,” Kitty said, squeezing his arm affectionately. “What gives?”  
  
“Oh, not fair!” Patrick protested. “What about last month? I played here for three nights before the real drummer made bail.”  
  
“That was in _January_ , you jerk, and we civilized people have this thing called a social call. If I didn’t know better I’d say you were only in it for the money. And who’s this?” Her eyes had fallen on Pete, who was still following behind Patrick with a big, star-struck grin. “Patrick, you’ve never brought a date here before. This one must be something special, huh?”  
  
“Yeah,” said Patrick, dearly hoping that the sudden tightness in his chest didn’t show on his face. “He’s the most.”  
  
Pete’s smile had changed into something small and quietly pleased and Patrick felt sick with it all. This had been a mistake, he realized, far too late. Distraction, he thought, that was what he needed. Something that would absolve him of having to think about it, just for a little while. He took off his jacket and hung it over the back of a chair, then reached for Pete’s hand.  
  
“Hey,” he said. “How about a dance?”

 

*

 

The two of them sat in the front seat of Pete’s car on the way home, sweaty and tired and giggly. Pete had turned out to be an abominable dancer, but he hadn’t let it hold him back. There had been a moment when the music had turned sweet and slow and Pete had pulled Patrick close, his eyes bright and his grin blinding, and Patrick had felt his heart skip.  
  
Patrick was laughing, dizzy with it, his head resting on Pete’s shoulder. Pete ran his fingers through Patrick’s damp hair and Patrick leaned into it. He pressed his face into Pete’s neck, smelling sweat and smoke and a ghostly hint of Pete’s cologne. _Kiss me_ , he thought. _Kiss me, kiss me, kiss me_.  
  
Pete pulled over at the side of the road, leaving the engine idling. Patrick wasn’t quite sure where they were, but the street was dark and quiet. Patrick’s heart was kicking, and Pete was all he could see. Slowly, slowly, giving him plenty of time to back away, Pete leaned in. “So,” he said, softly, his eyes flickering down to Patrick’s mouth. He licked his lips. “I’m really hoping I haven’t read you wrong, but is this…?”  
  
“Yeah,” said Patrick. He sounded breathless. “Yes, yeah, please--”  
  
Gently, Pete tilted Patrick’s face up towards him, and Patrick drew a shaky breath. Suddenly, it was as if there wasn’t enough air inside the car. Pete was gentle at first but Patrick kissed back greedily, tasting whiskey, his breath hitching when he felt Pete’s teeth. Pete drew a quick, gasping breath of his own and curled one hand around the back of Patrick’s neck, pulling him in. Patrick worked his hands into Pete’s hair and he moaned into the kiss, running his hand down Patrick’s back. Patrick felt like he’d been starving, and he wanted Pete’s hands all over him. He liked the way Pete touched him, like he wanted him, like Patrick was something special. Patrick’s hands were shaking. Pete kissed deeply, hungrily, like he couldn’t get enough, his tongue slipping into Patrick’s mouth.  
  
“You’re really something, you know that?” Pete murmured, his mouth ghosting along Patrick’s jaw, and Patrick shivered. “Solid gold, all the way through.”  
  
If Pete asked, Patrick thought--Pete kissed Patrick’s neck and bit down just hard enough to make him whimper--oh, god, if Pete asked, Patrick would have gone home with him in a heartbeat. God, Patrick knew it was stupid, he knew they’d be caught, but there was room in the back seat of the car and Patrick just _wanted_ \--  
  
“Hey,” Pete said, breathlessly. He had one hand cupped around Patrick’s jaw, his thumb rubbing over Patrick’s cheekbone. This was it, this _had_ to be it; he was going to ask and god help him, Patrick had never wanted anyone so badly.  
  
“Yeah?” Patrick’s own voice came out sounding more like a moan than a word, but he was past caring.  
  
Pete smiled and pressed a kiss to the corner of Patrick’s mouth. “This is your stop,” he said and reached out to open the car door.  
  
Patrick’s brain seemed to have stalled at the sudden gear change. This wasn’t right. What had gone wrong? Had he gone too far and scared Pete off? He stumbled out of the car, and Pete climbed out after him. Pete hadn’t lied, he’d pulled up outside Patrick and Andy’s building. Patrick had been so caught up in him that he hadn’t recognized the familiar streets passing by. Pete walked Patrick to the door, the silence between them humming.  
  
“Will you, uh… will you be at the bar tomorrow?” murmured Pete. He was flushed, his eyes bright and his hair sticking up where Patrick had run his hands through it. Patrick still didn’t quite understand what had happened, but at least Pete looked as wrecked as Patrick felt.  
  
“Yeah.” Patrick’s own voice sounded ragged. “Yeah. Will I see you there?”  
  
“I wouldn’t miss it for the world.” Pete kissed Patrick on the cheek, sweet and chaste, and a shiver thrilled through him and left him feeling weak in the knees. “Goodnight.”  
  
Pete got back into the car and disappeared into the night, and Patrick pushed door open and stepped inside. He stood in the lobby and waited for the elevator, trying his best to flatten down his hair, his hands still sticky with the pomade that Pete used. There were no mirrors, but he didn’t need one to know exactly what he looked like.  
  
When he got up to the apartment, Andrew was waiting up in the living room, reading a book with Princess draped over his lap. “What happened?” he asked.  
  
Patrick instinctively turned away slightly to hide the bruise he could feel darkening on his neck. He knew how he must have looked, his hair messed up, his cheeks flushed and his lips bitten and red. “Nothing,” he said.  
  
“Patrick--”  
  
“Don’t.”  
  
“We have to kill him,” said Andrew, quietly. “Fifty grand, Patrick.”  
  
“I know,” said Patrick. “I know.”

 

*

 

Patrick was still restless and distracted the next day. No matter what he did, memories of the night before kept catching him off guard. He was making coffee and he remembered how Pete’s hands had felt in his hair, he was sitting down with the newspaper and he remembered how Pete’s mouth had felt on his neck.  
  
Finally, he’d wandered into the living room and sat down at the piano, hoping to clear his head and keep his hands busy for a little while. The piano had come to them second or third hand, and it hadn’t been a particularly nice one even when it was new. But it was theirs, and Patrick loved it. They’d bought it years ago with money they’d made playing in restaurants and bars, before things had gotten bad and they’d had to stop being so choosy about the jobs they took. Whenever Patrick looked at it, it reminded him of the days when he’d been hungry all the time, happy and hopeful and so sure that they could really live like that. He wasn’t playing anything in particular at first, just stacking chords together and making up little bits of melody on top. After a few minutes, he slid into the opening bars of Witchcraft. It had been on the radio so often lately that he’d found himself humming it under his breath more than once, and he had some ideas about how to sing it. It might make a good addition to his set for the bar, he thought. People liked to hear the songs they knew, and he got bored playing the same old things night after night.  
  
But the words - _those fingers in my hair, that sly come-hither stare_ \- made him think of Pete. Goddamnit, was he never going to be free? It didn’t help that he’d woken up hard and panting that morning, struggling to pull himself out of a dream about the back seat of Pete’s car and what had so nearly happened there the night before. Maybe next time they’d do more than kiss and maybe Patrick would be cured, able to put Pete out of his mind at last. As he sang, he wondered what Pete would be like. He remembered how gently Pete had touched his face and then how he’d clutched at Patrick like he was drowning. Patrick shivered as he thought back to the dream he’d had, and fumbled the the next chord change.  
  
“ _Patrick_ ,” said Andrew’s voice from the doorway, delightedly scandalized. Patrick jumped. “Where on earth did _that_ come from?”  
  
“Oh,” said Patrick, trying to shake the distinct feeling that he’d been caught doing something he shouldn’t have. “You, uh. Noticed that, huh?”  
  
“It was shameless,” Andrew told him. “Borderline pornographic. I don’t know whether to have you arrested for public indecency or kiss you myself.”  
  
“I know it won’t make any difference to you,” said Patrick, who had begun to feel bad-tempered and vaguely ashamed of himself, “But I’m very uncomfortable with this.”  
  
“I mean, I’m strictly a ladies’ man,” Andrew went on. He clearly wasn’t listening. “But I’m telling you, I’m about one more song away from seriously compromising our working relationship.” He looked at Patrick appreciatively. “I’ve never heard you sound like that before. He’s not going to be able to keep his hands off you. Nice work.”  
  
Patrick looked down at his own hands, suddenly feeling joyless. “Yeah,” he said. “Let’s hope.”

 

*

 

True to his word, Pete was at his usual table when Patrick sat down to play that night. Pete was watching him with hot, dark eyes, making Patrick feel more naked in a shirt and tie than he would have thought possible. His concentration was slipping. He saw Pete lick his lips and remembered the flicker of uncertainty on Pete’s face as he’d leant in, remembered how it had felt to kiss him. Patrick tried not to blush.  
  
He shook himself. This was ridiculous, for heaven’s sake. Pete was supposed to be the one getting honey trapped, it should have been him getting hot under the collar. Two could play at that game, Patrick thought, grimly. He knew what he had to do. He just wished he hadn’t wound up having to do it sober. In an ideal world, he would have been insulated from the cold fingers of embarrassment by the warm blanket of hard liquor, but he was all out of other ideas. He took a deep breath, thinking about the Steinway, and began to sing.  
  
He looked up at Pete after the first verse, and the signs were encouraging. He’d been beginning to wonder if the song had been such a good choice after all. The words which had seemed so tame when he’d sung them in his pajamas that morning seemed to have taken on a life of their own. It was one thing to do it at home with no one but the cat for company, and quite another to do it with Pete undressing him with his eyes. But Pete had come over gratifyingly slack-jawed and starry-eyed, which caused Patrick a moment of vindictive satisfaction. He was showing off and he knew it, leaning into the low notes to turn them warm and rich, moaning a little into the high parts and letting his breath hitch.  
  
Pete cleared his throat and crossed his legs under the table, and Patrick smiled to himself.

 

*

 

An hour later, Patrick stood in the by the back door of the bar, looking up at the dark sky and enjoying the quiet. He knew he’d have to go back inside soon and finish his set, but he’d needed a minute to breathe. The door swung open and he looked up to see Pete crashing through it, looking flushed and wild-eyed. Patrick opened his mouth, not quite knowing what he was going to say, but Pete cut him off.  
  
“There you are,” he said. He backed Patrick up against the wall and kissed him hard, hot mouth and hot hands, grinding up against him. “God,” he said, roughly, “You have _no idea_.” He pulled on Patrick’s hair and Patrick gasped into his mouth, clutching at him, wanting to feel him everywhere.  
  
“Pete,” said Patrick weakly. He was finding it hard to think with Pete biting at his neck like that. “Pete, we’re going to get caught--”  
  
“Don’t care,” Pete said, his voice muffled. “Christ, I thought I was going to have to go and jerk off in the bathroom. What have you done to me?”  
  
Patrick laughed, low and dirty, and just for a minute he didn’t sound like himself at all.

 

*

 

After the stunt he’d pulled outside, Patrick was sure Pete would be waiting when he finished his set. If was desperate enough to kiss Patrick where anybody could have seen them, he had to be ready to take Patrick home. He tried to keep his mind on the music as he played, but it wasn’t easy. He could still feel all the places Pete’s mouth had touched, and the anticipation was unbearable.  
  
Patrick rushed through the rest of his set, pausing only when an older lady came up to the piano and asked whether the nice boy could play Ain’t That A Kick In The Head, since it was her husband’s favorite. She looked well-dressed and likely to tip, so Patrick forgot about L-O-V-E and began to improvise instead, trying to remember the chords. The arrangement wasn’t up to his usual standards, but it would do. The song wasn’t normally part of his repertoire and he had to concentrate, looking down at his hands almost the whole time. When he’d finished, there was another dollar bill in the glass he’d been using as a tip jar - and Pete was gone. Patrick got to his feet and looked around, wondering if he’d moved or if he’d just gone to the bathroom. But his table was empty, his jacket no longer draped over the back of his chair.  
  
“Goddamnit,” Patrick muttered, as he began to empty the tip jar into his wallet. He’d turned a good profit that night - apparently Pete wasn’t the only one who’d bought what Patrick was selling - but he couldn’t even bring himself to be pleased about it. What the hell had he done wrong? Pete had seemed eager enough, so what had changed his mind? It was bad manners, thought Patrick, seething, as he pulled on his coat. Pure and simple. It wasn’t right to string a guy along like that and then disappear. He couldn’t have made his intentions any clearer, and yet Pete had taken off with his heels on fire. Was he scared of being caught? Patrick didn’t think so, somehow - he certainly didn’t act like it. Did he know who Patrick was and what he was planning? Surely not. That was crazy, wasn’t it? Patrick wasn’t looking forward to explaining this to Andrew.  
  
Patrick was so caught up in his thoughts that it took him a moment to realize that someone was calling his name. “Oh,” he said, far too late. “Travis, I’m so sorry.”  
  
Travis grinned. He was a good guy, although, like Andrew, he seemed to believe that Patrick ought to have more fun and didn’t seem to care much whether Patrick agreed or not. “Good set tonight,” he said, mildly. Patrick had never been able to prove conclusively that Travis was responsible for the dance club calling him up when they’d needed a trumpet player, but he had his suspicions. “Loverboy left this for you.”  
  
Travis slid something across the bar to Patrick, who picked it up. It was a single sheet of paper, torn hastily from a pocket book. _Patrick_ , it read, in a spiky, angular hand that could only have been Pete’s. _I hate to run out on you like this, but duty calls.  
  
_ Patrick read the note several times, disbelieving, then crumpled it up into a ball and fought the urge to scream. Goddamnit.

 

*

 

“So, listen,” said Andrew, sitting down at the table across from Patrick. “The Wentz job.”  
  
Patrick lowered his spoon back into his bowl of cornflakes. It was almost four in the afternoon, but they’d finished all the bread the day before and Patrick’s options had been limited. “Yeah?” he said. “What about it?”  
  
“I think we need to cut our losses and forget about the bonus,” said Andrew. He wasn’t angry, just matter-of-fact, but Patrick felt his chest get tight. This was all wrong. It was too soon. He wasn’t ready.  
  
“What? No, I can… look, I just need more time. I can get what we need. I know it’s been slow, but he’s opening up.”  
  
“Patrick, you said it yourself. We’re getting nowhere with him. He hasn’t told you a thing.”  
  
Patrick opened his mouth to argue, then closed it again. It was true. “Not yet,” he said, weakly. “Just a couple more weeks, I know I can--”  
  
“The client called last night,” said Andrew, quietly. “He wanted to know why we’re sitting on our asses when Wentz is still walking around. His words, not mine.”  
  
Now that Patrick really looked at Andrew, he looked tired, his eyes dull and ringed with dark shadows. This hadn’t been the first phone call, Patrick realized. This was Andrew, his best friend, worn ragged because by an increasingly displeased client and not even telling Patrick he’d been sticking up for him. Patrick groaned. “Oh, Christ, Andy, I’m sorry. You should’ve said.”  
  
“Hey.” Andrew managed a smile that looked a lot like his old one. “It’s alright. It’s not your fault Wentz was tougher to crack than we thought. And we’ll still have the fifty grand.”  
  
“Yeah,” Patrick agreed, although he wasn’t sure what it was he was agreeing to. “Yeah, that’s…”  
  
“It’ll have to be me,” Andrew went on. “You two have been seen together too many times, we’d better make sure you’ve got an alibi. And it has to look like an accident, we can’t just put a bullet in him. We’ll set up a car crash.”  
  
Patrick felt sick, but it was awful and hypocritical and he knew it. Andrew was just talking business. Patrick had done the same thing any number of times after Andrew had come home with lipstick on his collar and a love note in his pocket.  
  
“And then we should probably--Patrick? You alright, buddy?”  
  
No, thought Patrick. “Yeah,” he said.  
  
Andrew wasn’t fooled. “I know it’s been hard,” he said. “I know it’s… complicated, for you. But you’ve done a great job.”  
  
“Uh huh,” said Patrick, dully.  
  
“Okay,” said Andrew, slowly. “I mean, you’re clearly _not_ alright. What’s the matter?”  
  
“I’m fine.”  
  
“You’re not.” He hesitated. “I know you’re not used to being so close to it all, but are you feeling…”  
  
Andrew knew, Patrick realized, with a sick, lurching feeling. He _knew_. How could he not? Patrick been staggering around, bleeding, and Andrew had seen before he’d been able to cover up the wound. Still, he swallowed, and said, “Feeling _what?_ ”  
  
Andrew looked almost apologetic. “Involved.”  
  
“ _Involved?_ ” Patrick repeated. He laughed, but it came out strained and slightly hysterical. Something in him had shattered and he hadn’t felt it until he’d moved, the pieces shifting and the sharp edges grinding together. “God, no! Can you imagine? I’ve spent the last week praying he’ll fucking kiss me, how on earth could I have gotten _involved?_ ”  
  
“Patrick--”  
  
“How do _you_ do it, huh?” Patrick snapped. “Do you pretend that you care, or do you pretend that you don’t?”  
  
“I do what I have to do!” suddenly, Andrew was almost shouting. In all the years Patrick had known him, he could count the number of times he’d heard Andrew raise his voice on one hand. “Jesus, you think I enjoy it?”  
  
“Yeah, I think you do, actually! I think you like getting what you want without having to get close!”  
  
Andrew made a shocked, shivery noise like he’d been doused in icy water. “Oh, fuck you,” he hissed. “ _Fuck_ you. This might be news to you, Patrick, but I’ve been where you are and I made all the same goddamn stupid mistakes you’re making, and you know what? It _broke my fucking heart_. So, yeah, I do what I have to do. Because that’s how I live with myself.”  
  
There was a long, horrible silence. Andrew was panting slightly, and Patrick could hear his own heartbeat thudding in his ears. Andrew didn’t talk about it, in the same way he didn’t talk about the orphanage - which is to say, not while he was sober - but there had been a girl, Patrick knew, back in California. Patrick looked away.  
  
“Andy, I’m sorry,” he said. “I was-- that wasn’t fair. I made this mess. I shouldn’t be taking it out on you. I was being an asshole.”  
  
Andrew waved Patrick’s apology away and let out a long, slow breath, pinching the bridge of his nose. “No sweat. Look, I’m sorry too. I know it’s hard. Maybe it should have been me.”  
  
Patrick tried to imagine Andrew making eyes at Pete. From the look on Andrew’s face, he was doing the same thing, and after a moment they both started to laugh.  
  
“He would have seen you coming from a mile away,” said Patrick. He was feeling better already. He hated fighting with Andrew. “You’re good with women, I’ll give you that, but you would have looked like an undercover cop.”  
  
“How dare you!” Andrew made a mock-offended face, one hand flying up to clutch at imaginary pearls around his neck. “I never knew you had so little faith in me.”  
  
“Yeah? Come on, then, prove me wrong. Show me your moves.”  
  
Andrew leaned in towards him, leering. “Hey, baby,” he said. “What’s a nice boy like you--”  
  
“So help me, if you say _doing in a place like this_ , I’m going to hit you.”  
  
Andrew raised his hands, laughing again, and Patrick shoved him affectionately.  
  
“So,” said Patrick, uncertainly. As he cooled down, he was beginning to feel thoroughly ashamed of himself. He cleared his throat. “Are we…”  
  
“We’re fine,” said Andrew, quickly, obviously keen to head off what promised to be a deeply uncomfortable conversation before it could get underway. “Honest.”

 

*

 

The tension with Andrew had eased, but Patrick still couldn’t settle to anything. He pulled several books down from the shelves in quick succession, giving up on all of them when he found himself reading the same sentences over and over again. He tried to play, but the piano seemed to be made of nothing but wrong notes, and he lasted about ten minutes before abandoning that, too. There wasn’t even anything to clean or tidy around the apartment, because Andrew had done it all in the wake of his recent fit of godliness.  
  
“Christ,” said Andrew, eventually. He was cleaning and oiling his gun at the kitchen table, the pieces arrayed in front of him and a smudge of something dark on his forehead. “Will you please just go for a walk or something? You’re making me dizzy.”  
  
Patrick grinned guiltily. “Sorry,” he said. “Maybe you’re right, I could use some air. You want to come with me?”  
  
“Oh, I thought I’d stay here tonight,” said Andrew, offhandedly, picking up the oil-stained rag again. “You know, wallow in self-pity, that sort of thing.”  
  
Patrick looked back over his shoulder and made a sympathetic noise as he buttoned up his coat. “Martha kicked your ass to the curb, huh?”  
  
Andrew always had a girl for the winter - usually a rich girl with a nice warm apartment. Patrick had liked Martha, she’d been a real barn burner with a quick temper and a wicked sense of humor. Too good for Andrew, of course.  
  
“Yeah,” said Andrew. He didn’t sound too upset. “It’s alright, she’d started asking questions.”  
  
None of Andrew’s revolving door of girlfriends stuck around for long. He liked them sharp, and eventually they all figured out that he kept odd hours even for a musician. Being a hitman played merry hell with one’s romantic prospects, but it never seemed to get Andrew down.  
  
“It’s better this way,” Andrew went on. “I think I needed some space. I was raised by wolves, you know.”  
  
“Andrew,” said Patrick. “You were raised by _nuns_. Nuns and the Irish mob.”  
  
“Yeah, and? Nuns, wolves, the mob, it’s all the same. Anyway, I asked Greta out again. You know, since I’m lonesome.”  
  
“You sensitive soul, you,” said Patrick, dryly. “What did she say?”  
  
“Oh, she shot me down. Said that even if she did dance, it wouldn’t be with me.”  
  
“Probably for the best,” Patrick said. He’d seen Andrew dancing - if one accepted a loose definition of the word - around their living room to one of their records one rainy afternoon, and he’d said, “Well, Fred Astaire you ain’t.”  
  
“Of course not,” Andrew had said, mid-twirl. “I’m obviously Ginger.”  
  
And Patrick had said, sweetly, “You’d look darling in high heels. I’ve always said so.”

 

*

 

Patrick hadn’t been headed anywhere in particular when he left the apartment, but his feet carried him to the bar of their own accord. Force of habit, he supposed, like a needle wearing out the groove on a record. He slid into a seat at the bar and slapped a greasy dollar bill down on the polished surface. It was a dollar they didn’t really have to spare, but he hoped Andrew would understand.  
  
“Keep ‘em coming,” he said, sliding the bill across to Travis, who put down the glass he was polishing, gave Patrick a long look and pushed the dollar back towards him.  
  
“On the house,” he said. He poured out a double measure of whiskey and nudged the tumbler towards Patrick. “You look like you could use it.”  
  
“Thanks.” Patrick took it and drank, feeling the liquor burning its way down. “New house rules? I thought the owner flipped his wig last time he caught you handing out free drinks.”  
  
“He can rattle his cage all he wants,” said Travis, mildly, picking up another glass and the rag he’d been using to clean the last one. “You’ve brought in a lot of bread for us lately.”  
  
Patrick tried to dredge up a smile. He wasn’t sure it was true, but he appreciated the thought. “Sweet of you to say,” he said. “A little apple butter goes a long way, you know.”  
  
Travis didn’t look convinced. “What’s eating you, huh?” he said. “You look like bad news.”  
  
For a split second, Patrick wanted to tell him everything. He sighed. “Nothing,” he said. “I got some bad news earlier, though.”  
  
A hand fell on Patrick’s shoulder and he started. “That’s too bad,” said a voice.  
  
Patrick turned around in his seat. “Pete,” he said. His heart ached. “It’s… good to see you.”  
  
Pete grinned and sat down next to Patrick. “Oh, please, a little less enthusiasm, it’s going to my head. You’re not playing tonight?”  
  
“Just visiting.” There was a slight, dark-haired kid at the piano playing Dream A Little Dream Of Me. He was doing a nice job, actually - his arrangement was better than Patrick’s. “How are you, Pete?”  
  
“Oh, no, we’re not talking about me. What’s this bad news, huh?”  
  
Patrick could feel his smile slipping. He hitched it back up. “Nothing,” he said. “Nothing I want to trouble you with.”  
  
“I’m glad to hear it.” Pete didn’t look like he believed Patrick, but he didn’t push it. Finally, at long last, he trusted Patrick. Patrick had thought it would feel good. It didn’t. “You got somewhere to be, or are you going to sit and have a drink with me?”  
  
Patrick hesitated.  
  
“My motives are purely selfish,” said Pete. He could see Patrick weakening, and he grinned. “If you say yes, I won’t be drinking alone.”  
  
It was that goddamn million dollar smile. Patrick could feel himself smiling back, despite everything. “Is that right?” he said. “Then I guess it’d be rude to say no, huh?”  
  
“Unconscionably rude,” said Pete, seriously. “Hey, Travis? Leave the bottle and put it on my tab.”

 

*

 

Several drinks later, Pete was laughing, his head thrown back. He was wonderful, happy and carefree, and he was a dead man walking.  
  
Patrick pushed it to one side. One night, he thought. That was all he wanted. Just one night where he didn’t have to think about the job. There was music playing, and there was someone watching him and wanting him, and if he pretended - if he screwed up his eyes and tilted his head sideways so he couldn’t see the shape of things - it looked a lot like the life he’d wanted.  
  
Pete leant in close and took his hand, the gesture going unnoticed in the crowd. He rubbed his thumb over the back of Patrick’s hand, and Patrick’s breath caught.  
  
“Come home with me,” Pete murmured. His voice was low and rough and Patrick felt it cut right through him.  
  
“Yes,” he said. His heart was slamming in his chest and suddenly all he wanted was to be away from all these people. “Yeah, please. Take me home.”  
  
Pete’s grin was blinding. He led Patrick towards the door, threading his way through the crush. They stumbled out into the cold night, and Patrick stood on the sidewalk and waited while Pete hailed a taxi. He opened the door so Patrick could climb in and gave the driver an address in the upper east side, and they pulled away from the curb. Patrick could see the driver watching them in the rearview mirror.  
  
“Hey, buddy,” said Pete. “Keep your eyes on the road and there’s ten bucks in it for you.”  
  
Ten bucks was a lot of money. “You got it, sir,” said the driver, and hit the gas.  
  
Pete leant over to whisper in Patrick’s ear. “You’re going to go for my belt if I let go of your hand, aren’t you?”  
  
“Probably,” admitted Patrick, who could see no reason to lie.  
  
Pete grinned, his head falling back against the headrest. “You’re killing me,” he said.  
  
Patrick freed his hand and trailed two fingers up Pete’s thigh, and Pete stifled a moan.  
  
“Christ,” he muttered. “Alright, alright. Come here.” He pulled Patrick into his lap, taking Patrick’s hand again and wrapping his free arm around Patrick’s back, holding him close. “I don’t know about you, but I’ve got plans for tonight that don’t involve us getting arrested.”  
  
Patrick rolled his hips down against Pete’s and it was good, so good, a slow, sexy, push-and-pull grind. It was making Patrick crazy, the warmth and the closeness and the hum of anticipation. “You’re no fun.”  
  
Pete huffed a laugh into Patrick’s neck. “If I let you have it your way I’m going to have to pay the man a lot more money.”  
  
Patrick made a petulant noise, which cut off abruptly when he felt Pete’s teeth on his neck. “What’s the problem?” he said. “You’ve got the dough, haven’t you?”  
  
“Patrick, I’m going to end up giving this guy a damn check,” Pete murmured. “Do me a solid and behave, huh? Just until we get home.”  
  
“Fine,” said Patrick, indistinctly.  
  
“Then you can do whatever you want to me.”  
  
“Promises, promises.”  
  
Pete let out a long, slow breath, running his hand down Patrick’s back. “My mom warned me about boys like you,” he whispered, tilting his head so Patrick could kiss his neck. “Oh, god. Hey, friend, you know any shortcuts?”  
  
“Shortcuts’ll cost you another five bucks.”  
  
“Done,” said Pete.  
  
The taxi turned sharply, screeching down a side street. Patrick was trying very hard to be good, but it wasn’t easy. He could feel the heat of Pete’s hands on him through his clothes, and he wanted more. A minute later, the cab braked sharply, shoving Pete’s hips into Patrick’s, and the sudden pressure and friction startled a loud, full-throated moan out of him.  
  
Pete’s eyes fell shut. “Jesus,” he breathed, so quietly Patrick could barely hear him. “I can’t wait to get you home. I want to know what you sound like when you don’t have to be quiet.”  
  
Patrick bit his lip and closed his own eyes. Be good, he thought. Be good.  
  
“Hey,” said Pete, softly. “Not much further. You alright?”  
  
“Yeah.” Patrick tucked his head into the curve where Pete’s neck met his shoulder. He could hold out just a little bit longer. It wasn’t so bad, holding hands and making out for a while. He could wait.  
  
Finally, after what seemed like hours, the cab stopped. Patrick hastily disentangled himself from Pete and climbed out, waiting impatiently while Pete fumbled with his wallet and handed several bills to the driver. Pete fumbled for his keys and unlocked the door, his hands shaking. A delicious shiver rattled all the way down Patrick’s spine, settling somewhere in his belly. He stepped inside after Pete and closed the door behind him, and then, oh god, he was backing Pete up against the wall and kissing him hard. Pete made a pleased, startled noise, wrapping one arm around Patrick and pulling him in.  
  
“Aren’t you pushy, huh?” he said, grinning against Patrick’s mouth. Patrick bit down on his lip and he caught his breath.  
  
“You can’t blame me,” Patrick murmured. He trailed his fingers down Pete’s arm, the lightest of touches, just to feel the way Pete shook. “Been thinking about this for weeks.” The liquor had made him brave and he knew it, but just then, he didn’t care.  
  
Pete’s answer was lost in a low moan as Patrick ducked his head, ghosting his mouth along Pete’s jaw. “You must think - oh, god - you must think I’m a real fast girl, putting out like this.”  
  
“Mm,” Patrick agreed. “Absolutely shameful. You got a bedroom, or what?”  
  
Pete laughed, sliding one hand into Patrick’s hair and kissing him again. “Sure, but what’s the rush? We’ve got all night. Unless you’ve got someone to go home to?”  
  
“No,” said Patrick, his own breath hitching. “Not me.” There was something else he’d been about to say, but he got caught up in the way Pete was licking into his mouth, slow and unhurried. He kissed like no one else Patrick had ever met, like Patrick was something he wanted to savor. Pete ran his hand down Patrick’s back to palm his ass, and Patrick whined. “Come on,” he said. “You can take me upstairs or you can fuck me here, it’s up to you.”  
  
Pete made a gorgeous, broken noise. “Jesus,” he said, weakly. “You’re dynamite, you know that? Follow me.”  
  
He took Patrick’s hand and led him up a flight of stairs, only stopping once to kiss him before pulling him gently down a hallway and, finally, into his bedroom. Patrick pushed him back against the door, pressing their bodies together from head to toe and bracing one hand on the doorframe. Pete ducked his head, resting his forehead against Patrick’s. Patrick could feel Pete’s breath on his cheek, fast and shallow. One of Pete’s hands had come to rest on Patrick’s hip and the other on the back of his neck, and just for a moment, Patrick allowed himself to enjoy the warmth of being held. It was good, but it wasn’t enough. He rocked his hips forward almost without meaning to, fitting his body against Pete’s, and Pete moaned. He was hard already, his cock riding the crease of Patrick’s hip every time Patrick moved.  
  
“Hey,” said Patrick, softly. “Hey, I want… can I-- _oh_ , Pete, oh my god.” His voice cracked slightly, and Pete stopped kissing his neck.  
  
“What, baby?”  
  
Patrick’s stomach flipped. The only people who had ever called him baby were the ones who hadn’t known his name. Clumsily - his hands were shaking and he felt hot all over - he dropped to his knees, and watched understanding dawn on Pete’s face.  
  
“Yeah?” he said, looking up and settling his hands on Pete’s hips.  
  
“Yeah,” said Pete, shakily. “Christ, yeah.”  
  
He ran one hand through Patrick’s hair, looking down at him with an awed, wide-eyed expression as Patrick worked at his belt buckle. Patrick was finding it hard to think straight. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d wanted someone so badly. He tugged Pete’s pants down over his hips. The hard line of his cock was obvious through his shorts, a faint wet spot showing through already. Patrick palmed him through his underwear, feeling the weight and the heat of him, and Pete let out a long, uneven breath. He stood there with his hands in Patrick’s hair, just looking down at him like Patrick was the best thing he’d ever seen. It was almost painful to look back at him, like staring into the sun. Patrick dipped his fingers under the waistband of Pete’s shorts and pushed them out of the way, and Pete’s fingers tightened in Patrick’s hair. Pete’s cock was hot and hard in Patrick’s hand, dark with blood, and Patrick gave him a slow, easy stroke. Pete bit his lip on a faint whine.  
  
Enough waiting, Patrick thought. He ducked his head and wrapped his mouth around Pete’s cock, and Pete’s head fell back against the door behind him with a thud.  
  
“ _Patrick_ ,” he said. His voice was rough but his hands were gentle. “Your _mouth_ , Jesus, you’ve got a gorgeous mouth. God, you look so damn good like that.”  
  
Patrick made an encouraging noise around him and sank down deeper, his own hands still resting on Pete’s hips. Pete moaned, low and drawn-out. Patrick knew exactly how he must have looked, down on his knees on Pete’s bedroom floor, too impatient even to make it to the bed, his mouth wet and open and stretched around Pete’s cock. Patrick pulled off and wrapped his hand around Pete again so he could lick under the head and Pete’s hips bucked forwards.  
  
“Fuck, fuck,” he panted. “I’m sorry, I’ll be good. Caught me by surprise. God, you’re something.” He looked wrecked already, his cheeks flushed and his hair falling in his face.  
  
“It’s alright,” Patrick said, rubbing idle circles in the hollow of Pete’s hipbone with his thumb. He wasn’t used to apologies. He sank down again, going deeper, encouraged by Pete’s ragged, drawn-out moan. Patrick knew he wasn’t supposed to be enjoying this. It wasn’t supposed to be good for him, but god, it was. Patrick was drowning in him, the noises he was making, the way he was cradling Patrick’s head in his hands, the weight of his cock on Patrick’s tongue, the way he tasted. Patrick still had his hands on Pete’s hips and he could feel Pete shaking, like it was taking everything he had not to let go and fuck Patrick’s mouth like he wanted to. Patrick moaned around him at the thought and Pete caught his breath, pulling at Patrick’s hair.  
  
“ _Patrick_ ,” said Pete, and it was more of a gasp than a word. “Patrick, if you don’t stop-- _ah_ \--this is all going to be over way too soon.”  
  
Patrick pulled off with a wet, obscene noise and wiped his mouth on the back of his hand. “Alright,” he said, grinning. He knew he looked a mess, but if the way Pete was looking down at him was any indication, he didn’t mind. “Why don’t you put your money where your mouth is?”  
  
Pete pulled Patrick up to his feet and reeled in him in for a kiss, deep and dirty and open-mouthed. Gently, Pete pushed him back towards the bed, until the edge of the mattress hit the backs of Patrick’s knees and he went down. He pulled Pete down with him, and Pete went without a fight. Pete undressed him painfully slowly, sweet talking him out of his clothes, stopping to kiss him every time he undid one of Patrick’s buttons.  
  
“Hurry _up_ ,” said Patrick. He was still breathing hard. Pete was straddling his hips, his weight giving Patrick something to rub up against. Pete laughed, giddy and breathless.  
  
“Oh no,” he said. “We’ve waited this long, I want to do this properly.”  
  
“We _are_ ,” said Patrick. “We should be playing catch up.”  
  
Patrick wasn’t so careful with Pete’s shirt, and a couple of the buttons popped off and flew across the room. Patrick didn’t waste any time feeling bad about it. He felt feverish, as if he was burning up. Pete’s skin was a deep, even gold, darker than Patrick’s even in the height of summer. Patrick pulled Pete down on top of him, just enjoying the warmth and the weight of him for a minute.  
  
“God, you’re beautiful,” Pete murmured, kissing his way down Patrick’s neck. Patrick didn’t feel it, particularly, he knew he looked soft and pale next to Pete, but the words still made him shake. “What do you want? Anything, whatever. We’ll do it.”  
  
Patrick was done waiting. “Fuck me,” he said. He rolled his hips against Pete’s, and Pete gasped into his mouth. “I want you to fuck me.”  
  
Pete moaned, maybe at the words or maybe just at the way Patrick had said them. “You sure?”  
  
“Believe it. C’mon, before I change my mind.”  
  
Pete laughed against Patrick’s neck, as inexplicably delighted as ever by Patrick’s smart mouth. He undid Patrick’s belt and Patrick lifted his hips up off of the bed, allowing Pete to get his pants off.  
  
“Your turn,” said Patrick, grinning, and Pete wriggled out of his own pants. Pete ducked his head to kiss Patrick again, tangling their legs together. Patrick bit his lip, rubbing up against Pete. He was aching to be touched, and the drag of his cock against Pete’s hip had him seeing stars. Pete laughed, low and rich, and sat back. His weight pinned Patrick to the bed, his knees on either side of Patrick’s hips, sinking into the soft blankets. Patrick skimmed his fingertips down Pete’s side and felt him shudder. Pete reached over into the nightstand and pulled out a jar of Vaseline, and settled himself between Patrick’s legs. Patrick propped himself up on his elbows, looking down at Pete as he opened the jar.  
  
“You gonna watch?” said Pete. He hitched Patrick’s leg up and trailed his fingers down Patrick’s thigh. The touch was featherlight, but Patrick drew a sharp breath through gritted teeth. He felt so raw, made up of exposed nerves. He didn’t know what to do with all this attention, all this care.  
  
“Wouldn’t miss it,” he said, grinning.  
  
Pete wrapped one hand around Patrick’s cock and his hips jerked, fucking up into Pete’s hand. Pete laughed, delighted.  
  
“You’re ready to go, huh?”  
  
“Yeah,” said Patrick, panting slightly as Pete jacked him. “And if you don’t hurry up, I’m going to go without you.”  
  
Pete leaned down to kiss him, smiling against Patrick’s mouth. “I see how it is,” he said. “Alright, baby, I’ve got you.” He slicked his fingers up and slid one hand under Patrick’s knee, folding his leg back. Patrick bit his lip, almost shaking with anticipation. Pete circled his fingertips, light and teasing, and Patrick groaned, shifting impatiently on the mattress.  
  
“Now,” he said. “Pete, come on, _please_ \--”  
  
Pete slid one finger inside, and Patrick keened. He opened Patrick up with strong, clever hands, pausing every now and again to kiss him, like he just couldn’t help himself. Patrick had never liked this part much - he’d always thought of it as something to rush through before the main event - but Pete took his time, and before long he had Patrick pushing back against his hand, wanting more.  
  
“Easy,” Pete murmured, touching his forehead to Patrick’s. “How’s that?”  
  
“Good,” said Patrick, weakly. Pete crooked his fingers and Patrick whined, his own fingers clenching convulsively in the sheets. “Oh, god, really good.” Pete’s grin was blinding and Patrick felt like he was burning up. “Come on, I’m ready.”  
  
“I’m sure you are,” said Pete. He was smiling, soft and warm, and Patrick fought the urge to look away. Pete took his free hand off Patrick’s knee and gave his cock a slow, easy stroke. Patrick moaned, overwhelmed by it all. “But you’re supposed to be enjoying it. Relax, huh? I want it to be good for you.”  
  
Patrick closed his eyes, his head falling back. “I am, I swear,” he said, his voice shaking. “You are. _Ah_ , ah, Jesus, your _hands_. There’s--oh, god--there’s something else I’d enjoy more, though.”  
  
“Alright, alright.” Pete gently slid his fingers out and kissed him, messy and sweet, moaning into it. “How do you want it?”  
  
Patrick hesitated. He wasn’t used to being asked. “Like this,” he said. “I want to see you.”  
  
Pete closed his eyes, just for a moment, like he was struggling to keep hold of himself. “God,” he said, reverently. “Yeah.” He reached down to line himself up and Patrick let out a long, slow breath. Pete sank into him slowly, and Patrick made a low, broken noise. This was what he wanted, this forever, to be balanced right at the top of a rollercoaster, knowing just how good it was about to get. Pete caught Patrick’s hand and tangled their fingers together. His mouth was slack, his eyebrows drawn together, panting as he bottomed out.  
  
“You can… I’m ready, you can move,” Patrick whispered. He was breathing hard, snapping for air. It would feel different in a minute, he knew, but just then it was all-consuming. He couldn’t think, couldn’t move, could only let his legs fall open and take it. It was so good, the stretch and the fullness and the crest of almost-pain before it tipped into pleasure. Pete was shaking, his hips rocking forward minutely, and Patrick could see the faint sheen of sweat on his skin. Pete pulled back and pushed back in, painfully slow, and Patrick threw his head back, gasping. He could feel the drag of every inch of Pete’s cock inside him and he felt so full he couldn’t think.  
  
“Come on,” Pete murmured. “Louder. It’s just us here, I want to hear you.”  
  
Patrick was so used to biting his tongue, stifling his moans, coming with his own hand over his mouth, that this was a rare luxury. It felt strange, at first, like he was playing a part. He wrapped one leg around Pete’s back, pulling him in. Pete was fucking him harder, faster, and Patrick rocked his hips back to meet him. Patrick could hear the little gasping noises he was making with each breath, punctuated with full-throated moans when Pete hit him just right.  
  
Pete laughed, breathless and delighted. “Yeah,” he said. “Just like that.”  
  
“I want--touch me?” said Patrick, his voice shaking as Pete pushed into him. He could feel it getting closer, his stomach tightening and his skin singing everywhere Pete was touching him.  
  
“Yeah, god.” Pete raised one hand to Patrick’s mouth and Patrick licked at his fingers, wet and messy, moaning around them. Pete was watching him with hot, hungry eyes, his rhythm faltering. He reached down and wrapped his hand around Patrick’s cock and Patrick made a noise that was right on the edge of a sob as Pete jerked him off in time with his thrusts.  
  
“Oh, Jesus,” said Patrick, weakly. “Pete, I’m--”  
  
Pete leaned down to kiss him, his free hand clenched in the sheets by Patrick’s head. “I’ve got you,” he said, his voice shaking. “C’mon, let me get you there. God, I bet you’re gorgeous when you come.”  
  
Patrick arched up towards him, gasping, too turned on to think, his whole body burning. He was so close, so close, his entire world narrowing down to Pete’s cock, Pete’s hand on him, Pete’s mouth on his neck. He came hard and fast and loud, spilling hot and sticky over Pete’s hand, shuddering and clenching around Pete as the aftershocks rocked him.  
  
Pete was looking down at him, his face almost reverent. “What do you know,” he breathed, grinning. “I was right.”  
  
Patrick grinned back, still breathing hard. He hadn’t even known it could feel like this, like more than just a race to get off, like-- he wasn’t even going to think the word. “Your turn,” he said, pulling Pete in, urging him deeper and pushing back against him. Patrick wanted it to be good for him, too.  
  
“God,” said Pete, hoarsely. “Patrick, _Patrick_ \--”  
  
“Yeah,” Patrick murmured, tangling his fingers in Pete’s hair, his voice cracking. “Yeah, that’s it, let me…”  
  
Pete’s rhythm began to fall apart and he made a low, broken noise, pressing his face into Patrick’s shoulder, his hand finding Patrick’s again. He pushed in one last time, burying himself in Patrick, and came with a shout that could have woken the neighbors. His hips twitched as he rode it out, and then he was still. They stayed there like that for a long moment, both panting, both speechless. Gently, Pete eased back out and Patrick winced.  
  
“Sorry, sorry,” Pete said, kissing him chaste and closed-mouthed. “Are you alright?”  
  
Patrick didn’t know what to say to that. “Yeah,” he said. “I’m - I’m alright.”  
  
Pete flopped down next to him, one hand resting low on his stomach. Patrick watched the rapid rise and fall of his chest for a long moment.  
  
“Give me a minute,” Patrick said. He knew he’d need to get up and leave soon, but he felt like his bones had melted. “I’ll get my things and go.” With an effort, he sat up and stretched. Now he was sobering up, he was starting to remember some of the things he’d said and the embarrassment was beginning to set in.  
  
Pete propped himself up on his elbow. “Hey, hey, hold up,” he said. “Go where?”  
  
“Home,” said Patrick, looking down at him. His skin was still damp with sweat and he could feel Pete’s come, warm and sticky between his thighs. “I don’t mind. Just let me wash up and I’ll get out of your hair.”  
  
Pete rolled his eyes. “Come back to bed. You can go home in the morning. I’d like you to stay.”  
  
Patrick hesitated. “Are you sure?”  
  
“Very. You stay here, I’ll go get a washcloth.” Pete pulled him back down and got up to go to the bathroom. He reappeared a minute later, his hands clean, and offered Patrick a damp washcloth to clean himself off. Once he was done, Pete turned the light off and pulled the covers up over them both and wrapped himself around Patrick as if to stop him leaving by any means necessary. He kissed the nape of Patrick’s neck, and Patrick shivered. “You’ll stay?” he murmured.  
  
“If you want,” Patrick murmured, sleepily. Pete was unlike anyone Patrick had ever been with before. He seemed untouched by shame, by the constant, gnawing, grinding fear of being caught. Patrick wondered where he’d learnt it; it was a hell of a trick. Pete’s money would have bought him some leeway, certainly, but surely not that much.  
  
“You’ve been lucky,” Patrick whispered, a minute or two later, when that thought was still chasing its tail around his head.  
  
“I’ll say,” said Pete, grinning against Patrick’s shoulder and somehow wriggling even closer.  
  
“Ha ha. I’m flattered, but not like that.”  
  
“Oh? How so?”  
  
No matter how Patrick lined up the words in his head, he still couldn’t make them sound the way he wanted them to. Hardly surprising, really, he supposed, after all the years he’d spent not talking about it. “Lucky like you’ve never had to be scared,” he said, eventually. “Like you can just… love whoever you want.” Lucky like any other guy. Lucky like Andrew, who could do what he liked and didn’t have to run until he saw an angry husband with a shotgun coming his way.  
  
Pete was quiet. He held Patrick tighter, then, after a long moment, he said, “You got caught, huh?”  
  
“In a manner of speaking.” Patrick didn’t particularly want to drag it all up again. They weren’t nice memories. “Not - caught, exactly, but I got into some trouble. Right place, wrong time.”  
  
“I’m sorry.”  
  
“Don’t be. It wasn’t your fault.”  
  
“It happened to me, once,” said Pete, and Patrick rolled over to look at him.  
  
“Really?” said Patrick. You wouldn’t know it, he thought. Not from the way you act. “When? What happened?”  
  
“College,” said Pete, reminiscently. It was dark, but he was faintly haloed by the streetlamp outside the window. “You should’ve seen me. I wore awful clothes and wrote a lot of dreadful poetry for boys who weren’t worth the heartbreak. I’m surprised it didn’t happen sooner.”  
  
Patrick didn’t understand how Pete could talk about it so casually. Just the thought set Patrick’s heart beating fast and his palms sweating.  
  
Pete’s smile dimmed as he remembered. “God, I was so gone for him. It felt like… I don’t know. Forever love.”  
  
“And it wasn’t?”  
  
“No. He broke things off. I was, uh… more than he could handle.” Pete made a visible effort to hitch the smile back onto his face. “Anyway, you don’t want to hear the whole sorry story. A professor walked in on us one afternoon. Didn’t turn us over to the police, let us both off with just a slapped wrist. Boys will be boys, that kind of thing. They wrote to my father, though. That was the worst thing.”  
  
Pete wasn’t smiling anymore. Sensing that they’d strayed into dark, sad waters, Patrick wrapped an arm around Pete and pulled him in.  
  
“I bet,” he murmured. His heart was heavy. “Come on, let’s get some sleep.”  
  
Patrick had never fallen asleep next to someone else before. He was still sweaty and filthy and exhausted, but he was so tired and Pete was radiating warmth. Just for a little while, he thought. What harm could it do?  
  
He closed his eyes.

 

*

 

Patrick stumbled through his front door the next morning with his head pounding and his stomach churning queasily. The subway ride from Pete’s place in the upper east side back out to Brooklyn had not agreed with him. Andrew was in the kitchen when he got in, drinking a coffee and wearing a terry cloth robe and slippers. He gave Patrick a long, knowing look.  
  
“Fuck you,” said Patrick, pre-emptively.  
  
Andrew raised his hands. “I’m not saying anything.”  
  
“No,” said Patrick, “But you’re thinking it.” He stalked past the kitchen to the bathroom. He was hungover and filthy and he needed to wash up. What he needed, really, was to stand in the shower until everything had blown over or until he’d gotten his head straight, whichever came first. Andrew followed him down the hallway.  
  
“Do you want an aspirin?” he called, through the bathroom door.  
  
Patrick turned the water on and the ancient plumbing sputtered to life. He cranked the heat up and waited. God, he felt awful, stiff and sore all over. “You can go and fuck yourself, Andrew.”  
  
“I’ll leave it outside the door.”  
  
“Thanks.”  
  
Once clouds of steam were rising from the shower, Patrick peeled out of last night’s clothes and stepped in. The water was hot enough to sting, but it was good. He stood there for a minute, willing his stomach to settle, resting his forehead on the tiles while the water pattered down on his shoulders. He could feel the panic welling up but he forced it back down, careful not to put words to the feeling. He took a deep, slow breath.  
  
“I’ll be in the kitchen when you’re done, alright?” said Andrew, from outside. “We need to talk.”  
  
Andrew left him alone, and Patrick scrubbed himself clean all over and shaved off several days’ worth of ragged stubble. True to his word, Andrew had left a glass of water and two aspirin outside. Patrick took the pills and drank the water, dressed in an old pair of pants and a big, soft shirt, and padded back into the kitchen. Andrew handed him a cup of coffee.  
  
“Take a seat,” said Andrew.  
  
Cautiously, Patrick sat down opposite him. “What’s the matter? I’m sorry, I know I should’ve called to let you know I wouldn’t be home, but--”  
  
“Forget it.” Andrew waved one hand dismissively. “It’s not that.” He paused, as if he was choosing his words very carefully. “I got a phone call last night. The hit’s off.”  
  
Patrick stopped dead. “Andrew,” he said, putting his coffee down on the battle-scarred table. His hands were shaking. “So help me, if you’re messing with me--”  
  
Andrew shook his head. “Cross my heart,” he said.  
  
Patrick felt weightless. The relief was indescribable, too big for his chest to contain. Pete was safe. It was only now he knew that he wouldn’t have to kill him that Patrick could admit to himself that he was a long way past the point where he could still have done it.  
  
And then reality set in and he crashed abruptly back into the kitchen. The client had had a change of heart, but not about Pete. Andrew had said it: nobody hired a hitman unless they were sure. When Patrick and Andrew had failed to deliver results, someone else had been sent in.  
  
Across the table, Andrew was watching all of this unfold on Patrick’s face. “I’m sorry,” he said, quietly.  
  
“Andrew, I can’t just leave him to die. I’m going to… Christ.” Patrick pushed his damp hair out of his face and rubbed his temples, wondering how much longer he was going to have to suffer before the aspirin kicked in. “I don’t know what I’m going to do, but I have to try.”  
  
“This is crazy talk, Patrick,” said Andrew, not unkindly. “What are you going to do? Follow him him home from work just to make sure no one else lays a finger on him?”  
  
Patrick shrugged, helplessly. His heart was racing, but whether it was panic or just the hangover he wasn’t sure. How long did he have? Patrick had no way of knowing whether or not the client had already had another killer - someone quick and efficient who wouldn’t be swayed by Pete’s smile or his smart mouth - waiting in the wings when he’d called Andrew. “I don’t know,” he said. “Maybe. Whatever I have to do. For now, at least.”  
  
Andrew looked resigned. “I thought you might say that.”  
  
Patrick blinked. He’d expected more resistance. “You’re going to let me do it?”  
  
Andrew sighed. “I don’t like it,” he said, bluntly. “And I think you’re going to get yourself hurt. But I’ve heard you talk about him and I know you’re a stubborn son of a bitch, so - yeah. I’m going to let you do it.”

 

*

 

Patrick came home two days later to find Andrew was leaning against the kitchen counter with his sleeves rolled up to his elbows, a cigarette in one hand and a beer in the other. He was also, Patrick couldn’t help but notice, covered in blood. It was all up his arms and down the front of his shirt. It was on his face and in his hair.  
  
“Hi, honey,” said Patrick, slowly. “Rough day at the office?”  
  
Andrew took a drag on his cigarette. “Some guy broke in while I was at the store. He had a pick. Don’t go in the bathroom.”  
  
“Damn.” Patrick blinked. “What the hell happened, did you hit an artery or something?”  
  
Andrew looked offended. “Please, I’m not that sloppy. He… wriggled.”  
  
“Hold on,” said Patrick, as something Andrew had said sank in. “Did you say he had a _pick?_ Like an ice pick? You think he was one of Anastasia’s guys?”  
  
Albert Anastasia’s organization, dubbed Murder Inc. by the papers, had existed to do the mob’s dirty work, but it had been disbanded fifteen years ago and the man himself had finally been shot dead in a Manhattan barbershop last fall. But ice picks had been the Murder Inc. trademark, and there were a few of the old guard who had escaped prison and kept on working.  
  
Andrew drank some of his beer, his fingers leaving a bloody smear on the label. “I wouldn’t read into it,” he said. “Probably just coincidence. Anyway, you know the guys that are still kicking will work for anyone now. There’s no way of knowing who sent him.”  
  
That much was true, at least, but Patrick still didn’t like it. “Hmm,” he said. “You want a hand cleaning up?”  
  
“If you’d be so kind.”

 

*

 

“And I said… Patrick? You still with me?”  
  
Patrick jumped, guiltily. Pete had stopped by earlier to take him out for dinner, but it wasn’t the first time that night Pete had caught Patrick’s attention wandering. It wasn’t that he was bored, or that he wanted to be somewhere else, but he was almost sure the man on the next table over was watching them. And - Patrick had thought he might have been wrong, at first, but he was getting more certain by the minute - the man had a gun in his jacket. Patrick was sitting on the right side of the table to watch him, but the wrong side to get between him and Pete if he made a move, and at this rate Patrick was going to wind up with an ulcer. “Sorry,” he said, sheepishly.  
  
He’d been half expecting Pete’s patience to start fraying, but instead, he turned a look of concern on Patrick and said, “You look pretty beat. How many shifts have they got you working at the bar?”  
  
“Enough to keep the bills paid,” said Patrick, which, sadly, wasn’t even true. He sighed, and ran one hand through his hair. “Pete, I’m sorry, I know I haven’t been a lot of fun this evening--”  
  
Pete waved his apologies away. “Forget it,” he said. “We all have bad days. Come on, let me drive you home. You have to promise me you’ll get some sleep, though.”  
  
Patrick managed a small smile. “Cross my heart.”  
  
Pete smiled back, and reached across the table to touch Patrick’s hand. It felt just like it did the first time, like licking a battery. “That’s what I like to hear,” he said. “Come on. Let’s get the check and blow this joint.”

 

*

 

“Back already?” said Andrew. He was leaning against the living room door with a cigarette tucked behind his ear, a glass of wine in one hand and an untidy sheaf of manuscript paper in the other. “What happened, did you have to leave before your carriage turned into a pumpkin?”  
  
“Ha ha,” said Patrick, as he unbuttoned his jacket and seized a different one from the coat stand instead, not bothering to check whether it was his or Andrew’s. “I’m not staying. There was a man at the restaurant, I’m sure he had a gun. Knife, _knife_ ,” he muttered, distractedly, patting himself down. If things got ugly, he wanted to be able to do what he had to quietly, without attracting attention.  
  
“Top drawer,” said Andrew, who was still standing in the doorway. “In the kitchen.”  
  
“In the--what the _hell_ is it doing there, Andrew?”  
  
Patrick didn’t need to see Andrew’s shrug to know that it had happened. “I don’t know. I thought it seemed like the best place.”  
  
“Of course you did. Of course you did.” The switchblade was exactly where Andrew had said it would be, lying innocently amongst a handful of assorted kitchen implements. “When I get back, you and me are going to have a talk. Right now, I need your gun, which I assume you’ve been keeping with the toothbrushes.”  
  
Andrew seemed to sense that Patrick wasn’t in the mood for joking around, because he put down the wine and and the half-written music and disappeared, returning a minute later to press a black market military issue Smith  & Wesson into Patrick’s waiting hand.  
  
“Thanks,” said Patrick, forcing himself to let out a long, slow breath. What he needed now was a clear head, not an itchy trigger finger. It was hard to shoot straight when your hands were shaking.  
  
“Don’t mention it. And - Patrick?”  
  
Patrick stopped, halfway out of the door, turning back to look over his shoulder.  
  
“Good luck,” said Andrew.  
  
I’ll need it, Patrick thought, as he pulled the door closed behind him. He almost ran down the hallway and hammered the elevator button as if that would make it come faster, drumming his fingers impatiently against his thigh as he waited. When he finally reached the street, he hailed a taxi, gave the driver Pete’s address and told him to floor it. It was a quick journey, and the streets were quiet, and Patrick tried not to think about the possibility that he might be too late.

 

*

 

By the time Patrick made it back to the apartment, he was dead on his feet. His limbs felt heavy as he shrugged off his coat and trudged into the kitchen, half-heartedly hoping that there might be some cocoa powder left in the back of the cupboard, or at the very least some milk in the refrigerator that hadn’t spoiled yet.  
  
“Alright, pal,” came a voice from behind him, deceptively friendly, and Patrick wheeled around. Silhouetted in the doorway was a tall, lanky figure holding a nail-studded baseball bat. “Get your hands up, or you and me and my good friend here are going to have a little talk.”  
  
Patrick sighed, and raised his hands. “Andrew, it’s me.”  
  
Andrew hit the light switch and lowered the bat. “Oh. Sorry, buddy.” He looked Patrick up and down and let out a low whistle. “Jesus, look at you. What happened?”  
  
“I took care of it,” said Patrick, wearily. “Pete’s fine. I waited outside his house, caught the guy as he was breaking in.”  
  
“Good.” Andrew put the bat down and propped it against the wall. They’d never had to use it - bats were messy and inefficient and relied on you being faster and meaner than the other guy, and without the element of surprise you were as good as dead - but it was a good thing to keep around the apartment. There was just something about the sight of a man holding a baseball bat with nails in it that really concentrated the mind of any would-be burglar. “C’mon, give me that shirt,” said Andrew. “You’ll never get the blood out once it’s dried.”  
  
Patrick looked down at his bloodied shirt as if seeing it for the first time. Had he buttoned his coat for the subway ride home, or had he sat there, bloodstained, for all of New York to see? He couldn’t remember. He started on the buttons with clumsy fingers as Andrew started filling the sink with water. Patrick peeled his shirt off and stood there in his undershirt, shivering, his arms folded over his chest, as Andrew rifled through the motley collection of jars and packets on the counter for the bicarbonate of soda. Neither he nor Patrick were exactly housewife material when it came to cooking and cleaning, but they couldn’t afford to replace every shirt that got a little bloody. They’d gotten very good at getting the stains out.  
  
Andrew held out his hand for the shirt. Patrick passed it to him and sat down at the table with a yawn, fishing Andrew’s switchblade out of his pocket and setting it down on the table. Andrew kept what he insisted was a very modest collection of knives, but this one was his favorite. It was a cheap, crummy little switchblade he’d had since he was fourteen, and he kept it so sharp that just looking at it from across the room was enough to leave a fellow bleeding. He called it Old Faithful, and he maintained that it had saved his life more than once.  
  
It took Patrick several seconds to realize that Andrew was saying his name. “God, I’m sorry,” he said, rubbing his eyes. “I was miles away. What’s the matter?”  
  
A frown of concern had settled on Andrew’s face. He reached out and squeezed Patrick’s bare shoulder. “Go to bed, Patrick. Get some sleep.”

 

*

 

Patrick lay sprawled out in Pete’s bed, watching the ceiling as the sweat cooled on his skin. He needed to wash up, but he wasn’t sure his legs would carry him. Pete had taken him out to another jazz club, and Patrick hadn’t thought twice about getting into Pete’s car at the end of the night. They’d staggered up the stairs together, laughing as they tumbled into bed, and Pete had kissed him senseless and said, “My turn.” Patrick had looked at him blankly for a long moment before he understood, and suddenly it was as if all the air had gone out of the room. “You don’t mind?” he’d said. He’d never been with anyone so willing to switch. Pete had just raised an eyebrow, with a hint of that sharp-edged, challenging smile that made Patrick’s heart beat faster. “I’m asking,” he’d replied. “What do you say?”  
  
Patrick had pinned him to the mattress and fucked him until he came, grinding against the sheets, Patrick’s mouth on the back of his neck. Patrick remembered Pete’s hands clenching in the sheets, the way he’d begged, the way he’d said Patrick’s name. Patrick shivered.  
  
Pete reappeared from the bathroom, and he smiled like he was pleased that Patrick hadn’t bolted.  
  
“Hey.” Patrick propped himself up on his elbow as Pete sat back down on the edge of the bed. “Where’d you get this?” he murmured, running his fingertips over the ragged filigree of scar tissue that spiderwebbed up from Pete’s knee, running halfway up his thigh. Patrick couldn’t believe he hadn’t noticed it before. Broken glass, maybe, he thought.  
  
Pete made a face. “Barbed wire,” he said. “It’s ugly, sorry.” He pulled the covers up over his legs. “I thought about covering it up with a tattoo, but - I don’t know, it would’ve felt too much like I was just trying to hide it.”  
  
“What happened?” Patrick asked, then backtracked when Pete’s smile slipped. “Sorry, you don’t have to say, that was really--”  
  
“France,” said Pete.  
  
Patrick had known that Pete had been to war, but he’d been an officer. Patrick had assumed he’d had a nice safe desk job, miles behind the lines. “Oh, Pete--”  
  
“My father pulled some strings,” said Pete. His voice had turned hard. “After I got hurt. Had me made a captain. He probably saved my life, but I didn’t… I didn’t ask for it. Didn’t even find out until I got the letter. No one else got pulled out just because their daddy had money.”  
  
“Do you mind talking about it?” asked Patrick, awkwardly. “Doesn’t it… I don’t know, make it worse?”  
  
Pete shrugged. “There isn’t much to tell, I wasn’t out there for long. C’mon, it’s late. Go to sleep.”

 

*

 

Pete woke up screaming and brought Patrick with him.  
  
Pete’s eyes were blank, unseeing, like he was somewhere far away and unreachable inside his head. Patrick didn’t know where Pete was or what he was seeing, but he’d seen Andrew wake up like this - it was subtler, with Andrew, but it was the same thing, Patrick was sure. Pete caught Patrick’s arm and wouldn’t let go, his fingers digging in as he shook.  
  
“Pete,” said Patrick, gently, then again when he didn’t respond. “Pete! You’re dreaming, Pete, it’s just a nightmare. You’ve just got to wake up and it’ll be over. C’mon, come back to me.”  
  
Pete didn’t seem to hear him so Patrick did the only thing he could think of, and held Pete until he stopped shaking, talking to him in a low, calm voice. Eventually, Pete’s grip slackened and Patrick watched recognition creep across his face by degrees.  
  
“Hey,” said Patrick. His mouth was dry, his heart beating hard against his ribcage. He swallowed, and tried again. “Hey, Pete. You’re alright. I’m here.”  
  
Pete sat up. He was quiet for a long moment, rubbing his eyes and not looking at Patrick. After the awful screaming, the quiet seemed fragile. Pete tried to smile, but it just looked like bared teeth. “I keep trying to forget,” he said, his voice hoarse, “But then I’m back in that foxhole and the shrapnel’s flying and my buddy’s bleeding out right next to me.” His hands were clenched in the sheets to stop them shaking. Unthinking, Patrick reached out to touch his shoulder, and Pete flinched. Patrick withdrew his hand, embarrassed.  
  
“I’m sorry you had to see that,” said Pete, stiffly. It was, Patrick realized, distantly, the first time he’d seen Pete look truly ashamed. “I’m not--I shouldn’t…” he trailed off, and made a frustrated noise. “So many of the others had it so much worse than I did. I should be goddamn fine.”  
  
“I’m not sure that’s how it works,” Patrick murmured. For a single, guilty moment, though, he wished that it was.  
  
“My doctor says it’s all in my head. I was already crazy when I shipped out, what’s different now?” Pete sounded bitter, angrier than he’d been in all the time Patrick had known him. “I’ve seen all kinds of shrinks. Get a hobby, get away for a while, get a damn dog. It’s better than it was, but--” Pete drew a deep, shuddering breath and scrubbed at his eyes again. “It’s been years, Patrick. What if this is it? What if there is no getting better?”  
  
“Oh, Pete,” said Patrick, quietly. He wished there was something - anything - he could do to stop Pete hurting, to stop the bleeding. “Is this--does this happen a lot?”  
  
Pete shook his head, a tense, jerky movement. “Not as much as it did when I first got back,” he said. He drew a short, sharp breath and let it out, clearly done talking about it. “But - it happens now and again and even that’s too much.” He sighed. “You don’t have to stay.”  
  
Patrick lay down again and pulled the covers back up, reaching cautiously for Pete and pulling him close when Pete didn’t flinch at the touch. “I know,” he said. “But here I am.”

 

*

 

They didn’t talk about it in the morning.  
  
Patrick woke up hungover in Pete’s bed for the second time in as many weeks. The sun was streaming in, falling across the sheets in a slice of golden light.  
  
“This is getting to be a habit,” he muttered, sitting up and rubbing his eyes.  
  
Next to him, Pete made a muzzy noise and opened his eyes. His hair was sticking up in all directions, still sticky with pomade. “Can’t say I mind,” he said, his voice rough. There were dark shadows under his eyes, but if it hadn’t been for that, Patrick might have wondered if he’d been the one dreaming last night, not Pete. The night had taken on a strange, fever-dream quality. “Morning, sunshine.”  
  
“I should--” Patrick began, but Pete cut him off.  
  
“Patrick, so help me god, don’t you dare say ‘leave’.”  
  
Patrick laughed. “Alright, alright. I’ll stay. Just for a little while, though.” Andrew would be getting worried.  
  
“Damn right you will,” said Pete, with great satisfaction.  
  
They lay like that for a while, Patrick running his fingers through Pete’s hair. Pete pulled Patrick closer and rubbed his foot lazily down the side of Patrick’s calf. Patrick could quite happily have stayed forever. Eventually, Pete got to his feet and stretched, then padded into the bathroom. A moment later, Patrick heard water running. He closed his eyes. Pete’s mattress didn’t have any stabby rogue springs like Patrick’s did, and it made a nice change. He knew he had to go home, but he could have stayed there all day.  
  
“Patrick?” called Pete from the bathroom, his voice bouncing off the tiles. “You want a bath?”  
  
Oh, god, Patrick did. He sat up and stretched. “I shouldn’t,” he said, around a yawn. “I really do have to--”  
  
“Oh, no, you promised. Come on.”  
  
Pete reappeared, took Patrick by the hand and led him into the bathroom. Ignoring Patrick’s complaining, Pete pushed him gently towards the tub. It was a big, old-fashioned thing, almost as big as the entire bathroom in Patrick and Andrew’s place. Patrick stepped in, and Pete followed suit. It was, Patrick had to admit, actually pretty nice. The water was hot, the steam filling the room, Pete warm and close behind him. Patrick tipped his head back, resting it on Pete’s shoulder.  
  
“Alright,” he said. His voice was still rough from the night before. “You win. This is heaven.”  
  
He was feeling more human already.  
  
They sat there in the bathtub until the water went cold, Pete tracing patterns on Patrick’s arms and shoulders with his fingertips. When Patrick shivered, Pete laughed, his mouth grazing the shell of Patrick’s ear.  
  
“Alright,” said Pete. “Time to get out and get warm. We can’t have you getting sick.”  
  
Patrick stood up and stepped out onto the mat, feeling unsteady on his feet, drugged by Pete’s closeness and his sweet, idle touches.  
  
“So, listen,” said Pete, as he handed Patrick a thick, soft towel. “Friday night. Dinner. There’s a little place I know, you’ll like it. Doesn’t that sound good?”  
  
It didn’t, especially after the last close call. A restaurant was a minefield. Other diners, waitstaff, too many doors to watch at once.  
  
“Or not,” said Pete. Something of Patrick’s horror must have shown on his face. “Here, then. I’ll cook. Let me dazzle you with my bourgeois incompetence in the kitchen.” He was grinning, and Patrick softened.  
  
“Well,” he said, as he wandered back into Pete’s bedroom and started looking for his clothes from the night before. “You can’t be any worse than my roommate.” Patrick had vetoed the ham and bananas hollandaise from page sixty of _Contemporary Cooking_ right off the bat, and they hadn’t even finished making the tuna Jell-o pie before abandoning ship. Andrew almost never got angry, which was why it was so entertaining to see him storming around the kitchen, cursing like a sailor and sweeping things into the trash with a cigarette in one hand and a glass of cheap wine in the other. The frosted lime and walnut salad hadn’t been bad, though. Smiling back over his shoulder, Patrick said, “But - yeah. Thank you. I’d like that.”  
  
“Any time,” said Pete, picking Patrick’s shirt up off the floor and holding it out to him. “Doesn’t take a shrink to see that there’s something on your mind.”

 

*

 

Patrick didn’t really drink wine anymore, mainly because there were cheaper ways to get drunk and still wind up with less of a headache in the morning. But he took the glass Pete handed him, and drank. It was good, dark and velvety, and he relaxed slightly. Pete was safe, he reminded himself. On his previous visits - he could feel the color rising in his face as he remembered - he hadn’t been paying much attention to anything but the bedroom, but the rest of Pete’s house was nothing like what he’d pictured. It was an old brownstone in the upper east side, smaller than Patrick had been expecting, and less flashy on the inside. It was tidy (Patrick thought he detected the hand of a housekeeper) but busy, cluttered, comfortable. It felt lived-in. Patrick and Andrew’s apartment was similarly full of things, but in a very different way. They held onto things because it paid to keep stuff around when having something that could be pawned or repurposed sometimes meant the difference between eating and going hungry. Everything in Pete’s house, meanwhile, had a place and a reason for being where it was. It filled Patrick with a longing that could, less charitably, have been called envy. One wall of the living room was taken up by bookshelves, the books stacked two deep in some places. Another shelf held records, and Patrick wandered over to take a look.  
  
“This is quite a collection you’ve got here,” he murmured, skimming his fingertips reverently over the records on the shelf. He paused when he reached _Ella And Louis Again_ and carefully pulled it free, tipping the record out of the sleeve. “This is new, isn’t it?”  
  
Pete leant down over his shoulder to see what he was holding. “Yeah, fifty-seven. Just last year. Put it on.”  
  
Patrick gave his glass to Pete to hold, then got up and walked over to Pete’s record player. It was a newer, more expensive model than the well-loved Dansette that sat in the corner of Patrick and Andy’s living room and it sounded beautiful, warm and rich. He swayed a little as the first song started to play. Pete came up behind him and wrapped one arm around Patrick’s waist, pressing a sweet, chaste kiss to Patrick’s cheek. It was such a familiar, intimate gesture that it made Patrick feel stripped bare, equal parts thrilled and frightened. It made him feel so _much_ , somehow, that it reassured him that he was doing the right thing in keeping Pete safe. He leaned into the touch, his back against Pete’s chest. All Patrick could think about was Pete’s mouth. Pete had put some kind of spell on him, that was the only explanation. It was making him crazy.  
  
“Now, I seem to remember that I promised you dinner,” said Pete, and Patrick could hear the smile in his voice. “You hungry, or should we wait?”  
  
“Starving,” said Patrick, which, now that he thought about it, was true. He’d spent the last few weeks sleeping when he could, eating at strange times or not at all, and he wasn’t sure how long it had been since he’d last stood in the kitchen of his own apartment and pawed through the cupboards for something he could make a meal out of.  
  
“Alright.” Pete handed Patrick back the glass of wine. “I’ll start now, and--”  
  
He went quiet, and suddenly Patrick was barely breathing. They’d both heard it. A squeak, like hinges that needed oiling, and a muffled thud, like feet. Not now, thought Patrick, desperately, not _now_. He’d been so happy just a minute ago, and now it was as if a switch had been thrown and all the light had been sucked out of him.  
  
“Pete,” he whispered, trying to keep his voice steady despite the frantic hammering of his heart. “Is there anyone you can think of with a good reason to be in the house right now?” Perhaps he was overreacting, he thought. Perhaps the late nights were getting to him. He’d wondered about  a housekeeper earlier, perhaps that was all it was.  
  
But Pete, wide-eyed and silent, shook his head.  
  
“Alright. Get behind me, and keep quiet.”  
  
“I’m calling the cops,” Pete muttered, reaching for the door. “The phone’s out in the hallway--”  
  
By the time the cops arrived, it would be too late. “Pete,” said Patrick, evenly. “ _Get behind me_.”  
  
Startled into obedience, Pete allowed Patrick to ease the living room door open and he edged out into the hallway, trying to make as little noise as possible. Why the hell hadn’t he brought a knife with him? He’d thought that the discovery of a gun in his jacket would have raised some awkward questions when he eventually took his clothes off, but it suddenly seemed impossibly naive not to have so much as a switchblade in his pocket.  
  
Patrick heard another soft, hesitant footfall, deliberate and careful. If he hadn’t been listening, he might not have heard it at all. Pete tipped his head towards the kitchen door and mouthed _in there_ , and Patrick nodded. He knew that there would be no coming back from what he was about to do. No matter how he tried to talk his way around it afterwards, it would color the way Pete saw him forever, but there was no time to mourn the loss. Careful not to look back at Pete, he moved lightly down the hallway and threw the kitchen door open.  
  
The kitchen was small, but not small enough to hide a man. He stood by the open window, frozen like a rabbit caught in the headlights, although Patrick knew that wouldn’t last. He was small and slight - he would have had to be, to get through the window - but that didn’t mean a goddamn thing. A burglar, thought Patrick, desperately, please let him be a thief. God, let him be a little guy out to make a few bucks in the wrong place at the wrong time.  
  
And then he pulled a knife, and time started running again like an engine turning over. In an instant, Patrick’s priorities had changed. It didn’t matter what Pete thought, only that Patrick could protect him. Patrick lunged, grabbing the guy around the wrist. He didn’t bother trying to pry his fingers away from the handle of the knife, just cracked his hand sharply against the edge of the counter.  
  
“ _Shit_ ,” he grunted, scrabbling at Patrick with his free hand, going for his eyes. Patrick moved fast, ducking out of the way, and slammed his fingers against the counter again. It was a serious knife, several inches of blade and a drop clip point, a much more substantial weapon than Andrew’s lethal switchblade. Someone was going to get hurt, and that person was going to be Patrick - and then Pete - if he couldn’t get the knife out of this guy’s hand. If Patrick had to break some fingers to do it, well, he wasn’t about to lose any sleep over it. _Rule number one,_ said Andrew’s voice in Patrick’s head. Patrick could see him, as clear as day, his switchblade like an extension of his arm, shifting his weight easily from foot to foot. _It’s him or you,_ _don’t fucking hesitate. The moment you stop to wrestle with your conscience, it’s already too late. There is no rule number two, that’s the only thing you’ve got to remember. Nothing to it.  
  
_ Distantly, Patrick was aware of Pete’s voice. “Stay back, Pete,” Patrick snarled, not looking around. One more sharp crack on the edge of the counter and something gave with a crunch, the knife slipping free of the guy’s fingers and clattering to the tiles. They both dived for it, but Patrick was faster, and he was sure he’d broken the guy’s dominant hand. He went for Patrick's shirt collar instead, trying to slam his head against the cupboard door, but Patrick twisted away and heard his shirt tear, the collar coming away and flapping uselessly. It felt messy, frantic, dangerous. There was no tough talk, just the noise of both of them breathing hard and fast. The guy was scrabbling for the knife with his left hand, trying to pry it out of Patrick’s fingers. Patrick caught the guy’s broken hand with his free one, and squeezed hard. The guy made a noise like a dying animal and Patrick pressed his advantage, spinning him around and pressing himself against the guy’s back.  
  
“Now,” Patrick said, panting, pressing the blade of the knife against the guy’s belly to discourage him from trying to squirm away. “You gonna tell me who sent you?”  
  
Patrick could feel the fast, frightened rise and fall of his breathing. The guy jerked his head back, the back of his skull connecting with Patrick’s nose. Patrick’s eyes watered but he hung on, and the guy spat on the floor. “Go fuck yourself.”  
  
“You first,” said Patrick. It’s him or you, he thought. There is no rule number two _._ In one quick, businesslike movement, Patrick drove the knife into his chest, and he slid to the floor. Patrick looked up at Pete and they stared at each other for a long moment, both breathing hard. The silence went on and on, stretching away into forever as blood pooled slowly on the tiles. Pete was looking at him like a stranger, like a beloved pet that had suddenly shown its teeth. It made Patrick feel unclean in a way that nothing else ever had, like no matter what he did, no matter how good or kind he tried to be, no matter how much beautiful music he made, he would always be this underneath.  
  
Finally, Pete said, “Explain.”  
  
Patrick ground the heels of his hands into his eyes. He hadn’t slept in three days. “Hi,” he said, looking up at Pete. His heart felt heavy. It was time. “My name’s Patrick, and I’m a hitman.”  
  
Pete hesitated, just for a beat, then let out a strangled laugh. Patrick waited, and after a minute, Pete stopped laughing, the sound dying away quickly in the bright kitchen.  
  
“You’re joking,” said Pete flatly.  
  
“No,” said Patrick, and then, sincerely, “I’m sorry.”  
  
He watched, sadly, as Pete put two and two together.  
  
“I’m going to clean up this mess,” said Patrick. “Don’t call the cops, alright?”  
  
He turned away so he wouldn’t have to watch Pete leave. Pete had no reason not to turn him in, he thought, as he rolled up his sleeves, wrapped the body in a tablecloth and dragged it out to the garage. That was all he could do for now. Andrew was better at this part than he was; he’d call him and ask him to take care of it later. Patrick was half expecting the cops to kick the door down while he was scrubbing the dark stain off the tiles, or while he was standing over the sink, streaked with gore all the way up to his elbows. He was exhausted, swaying on his feet.  
  
With the kitchen scrubbed clean and the corpse safely out of sight, Patrick went looking for Pete, feeling like a trespasser in his house. He found him in the study with a gun in his hands.  
  
“Stay there,” said Pete. Patrick didn’t know how good a shot he was, but it hardly mattered at such close range. “Don’t come any closer.”  
  
Slowly, Patrick raised his hands. “I’m not armed.”  
  
“I don’t believe you. How long?”  
  
“What?”  
  
“You heard me. It was a setup from the start, wasn’t it?”  
  
“Pete, you have to understand--”  
  
“Answer the question.”  
  
“Yes,” said Patrick, quietly, and it sounded like a gunshot.  
  
Pete nodded, just once, his jaw tight. “That first night,” he said. His voice shook, but his hands were steady on the gun. It was a military issue Colt - he’d been a soldier, Patrick remembered. “At the bar. You knew who I was, didn’t you?”  
  
“Yes.” Every time Patrick said it, he could feel more of himself being chipped away.  
  
“Were you going to kill me that night?”  
  
“No.” Patrick drew a deep breath but there didn’t seem to be enough air in the room. “It was… reconnaissance.”  
  
“Recon,” Pete repeated. “Wow. Fuck you, Patrick. _Fuck you_.” For a long moment, he didn’t say anything. Then - “I wanted to take you home,” he said. “That night in the car.”  
  
“I would have let you,” whispered Patrick. That night was pressed into his memory like a bruise. The music, the smokey half-light of the club, Pete’s wild grin, his sleeves rolled up, the way he’d taken Patrick’s face in his hands and kissed him in the back of the car. Patrick wanted to reach out and hold him, stop him twisting the knife. He wanted to say, _you were easy to love_ , but the words seemed to have turned to dust in his mouth.  
  
Pete raised a sardonic eyebrow. “Tell me,” he said, “Was seducing me part of your plan? Or was it just that you were lonely and I was an easy lay?”  
  
Patrick didn’t say anything, but his expression spoke for him.  
  
Pete snorted. “Figures. I never fucking learn. At least tell me you’re queer.”  
  
Patrick swallowed. “Yeah. I am.”  
  
Pete laughed, sharp and ugly. “Oh, well. That’s one less thing to worry about. I’d hate to think you were cringing every time I touched you while you were planning my murder. God.” He shook his head, disgusted.  
  
There was a ringing in Patrick’s ears, like a bomb had fallen and the noise was still echoing. This, he thought, was why he’d always stuck to flings. This was why he never got involved. “Pete,” he said. “The hit’s off. I’m… I’m not going to kill you. I’ve been trying to keep the others off your back.”  
  
“You’ll forgive me if I don’t believe you,” said Pete, coldly. “I’m finding out all kinds of unpleasant things today.”  
  
Patrick ducked his head. He didn’t blame Pete for that. “It was real,” he said, quietly. He knew Pete wouldn’t believe it, but he had to say it. “Pete, I--”  
  
“Stop,” said Pete, roughly. “Just--stop. I don’t want to hear it.” He put the gun down and got to his feet, and the next thing Patrick knew, Pete was shoving him up against the wall.  
  
“You wanted to kill me,” Pete said, and his voice was raw.  
  
“Not _wanted_ ,” said Patrick weakly.  
  
“Don’t split hairs,” growled Pete. “You were going to murder me for money.”  
  
Patrick closed his eyes. There was no way around it. “Yes.”  
  
“How much?”  
  
“Well, nothing, now that--”  
  
Pete shoved Patrick hard, and he hit his head on the wall behind him.  “Fucking-- _how much_ , Patrick?”  
  
“Fifty grand.”  
  
“And what were you going to spend it on?”  
  
“A Steinway,” Patrick admitted, and Pete laughed. It was a cold, mirthless sound.  
  
“Well. Next time my mother asks what I’m good for I’ll be able to tell her my miserable life is worth a Steinway grand.” His eyes were bright and wet.  
  
“Pete,” said Patrick, in a small, choked voice. “I’m so sorry, I never--”  
  
“God, _stop!_ ” Pete pushed Patrick again, crowding into his space and slapping one hand over his mouth. “I can’t… I don’t want to hear how fucking sorry you are, it doesn’t change _shit_.” He jerked his hand back. God, if he’d just been angry Patrick could have taken it, but he looked so hurt and that was a hundred times worse. Patrick didn’t know what Pete had seen in his face, but he obviously didn’t like it. His expression went blank, shutting Patrick out.  
  
Pete had never been a boxer. He telegraphed the punch and Patrick ducked away from it easily. He was fast, though, and he took another swing at Patrick that caught him off guard, his knuckles connecting with Patrick’s cheekbone. Patrick swore, reeling, but didn’t go down.  
  
“Pete,” he said, desperately, trying to hold Pete’s hands still, just for a minute. “ _Listen_ to me--”  
  
“Fuck you,” Pete snapped back, and wrenched his hands free. He lashed out again and Patrick batted his fist away before it could touch him. Patrick’s cheekbone ached where Pete had hit him, a sick, dull throb of pain that pulsed in time with his heartbeat. Patrick slammed him back against the wall and heard the air leave his lungs. He didn’t want to hurt Pete, just hold him still for a minute so he could get his head straight, but he didn’t know--  
  
Pete was hard.  
  
Patrick could feel the line of Pete’s cock pressed against his thigh. Patrick stalled for a moment, his wheels spinning as he struggled to change gear. Pete tilted his head up defiantly, as if to say, _Yeah? Want to make something of it?  
  
_ Patrick rolled his hips and Pete gasped, biting down on his lip. Pete worked his fingers into Patrick’s hair and pulled hard, tugging Patrick’s head back and making him moan. Patrick’s hips rocked forward again, his body acting on pure instinct. He kicked Pete’s feet apart and slid one of his thighs between Pete’s, and Pete made a low, broken noise. Pete raked his nails down Patrick’s back.  
  
His hands shaking, Patrick unbuckled Pete’s belt and yanked his pants down, then spat into his own palm and wrapped his fingers around Pete’s cock.  
  
“Oh, fuck, fuck _you_ ,” Pete choked out, his hips bucking into Patrick’s hand. Patrick ran the pad of his thumb through the wetness at the tip of Pete’s cock and spread it around, making the slide slicker, hotter. Pete’s mouth was hot on Patrick’s neck and he bit down, startling a bitten-off shout out of Patrick. Patrick jerked him off hard and fast, rutting against his thigh. Pete pulled Patrick’s hair again and he whimpered, the pain going straight to his cock.  
  
“Come on,” Patrick gritted out, working his hand faster as Pete groaned, his hips jerking. The pad of Patrick’s thumb caught under the head of Pete’s cock, his fingers slipping. Pete came hard, his whole body jerking, with a noise like he’d been hurt.  
  
“Your turn,” Pete panted through clenched teeth, working his fingers into Patrick’s hair as Patrick ground against him, his forehead buried in Pete’s neck. Patrick could feel it getting closer, his whole body winding up and his skin on fire. Pete’s fingers tightened in his hair, pulling hard, and Patrick came with a choked sob, and it was over.  
  
Pete dropped his head onto Patrick’s shoulder and they stood there for a minute in the wreckage of everything, both panting. Just for a moment, Patrick thought they might still be able to fix things, then Pete shoved him away.  
  
“That’ll bruise,” he said, tonelessly, touching his fingers to the tender place on Patrick’s cheekbone. “Put some ice on it.” He pulled his pants back up and turned to leave, avoiding Patrick’s eyes. “Clean up and get out. If I see you around here again I’m calling the cops.”  
  
Slowly, numbly, Patrick tucked his shirt in and did up his belt. His hands were clean, but his shirt was still flecked with blood. Now that the sweat was cooling, he felt cold and clammy. He followed Pete out of the room and started back down the stairs. What he wanted more than anything else was to go to bed, and sleep until he wasn’t tired anymore, and wake up to find all of this undone.  
  
But he couldn’t. He took a deep, steadying breath. Get rid of the body. That was the first thing. Mechanically, he dialled his and Andrew’s number from the telephone in the hall and closed his eyes, tipping his head back against the wall and waiting for Andrew to answer. It was late, but it didn’t take long.  
  
“Hello?”  
  
“Andrew, it’s Patrick.”  
  
“Patrick, hey. Is everything alright?”  
  
“Yeah, yeah. Listen, you gotta see this girl, Andy, she’s the most. New York eyes, Chicago thighs, I swear.”  
  
“Oh, yeah? She got a sister?”  
  
“Yeah. We’re at her place.” Patrick gave Andrew the address and hung up the phone without waiting for a reply. Andrew would be there soon with a stolen car and everything they needed to make a body disappear.  
  
He didn’t have to wait long. The car that pulled up outside was several years old, a big, boxy thing, dark and nondescript, with plenty of room in the trunk. Andrew climbed out, and Patrick opened the front door to let him into the house.  
  
“Hey, Cinderella,” Andrew said, gently, and Patrick gritted his teeth. Patrick could feel Andrew looking at his tousled hair, the mark on his neck, the bruise on his cheek, the beginnings of a black eye. Patrick was half expecting Andrew’s customary ribbing, but all he said was, “Prince Charming not here?”  
  
Patrick thought about Pete. He was probably upstairs, scrubbing Patrick’s fingerprints off. “No,” he said. “He’s not.”  
  
“I meant the body.”  
  
“Oh. In the kitchen.”  
  
Andrew helped Patrick get the body into the trunk, and they drove away into the night. Patrick wanted to look back, could feel his whole body straining to turn around in his seat, but he didn’t let himself do it. Instead, he pressed his fingertips into the hot, angry bruise on his cheek. It hurt, but not as bad as thinking did.  
  
“So,” said Andrew, eventually. “He knows, huh.”  
  
Patrick had to swallow around the lump in his throat. “Yeah,” he said. “He knows.”  
  
“About everything?”  
  
Patrick nodded, not trusting himself to speak.  
  
Andrew sighed. “I’m sorry,” he said, his eyes fixed on the road ahead.  
  
“Hey,” said Patrick, dully. “You warned me.”  
  
“Yeah,” said Andrew, looking up at Patrick. “Doesn’t mean I’m not sorry.”

 

*

 

“You’re going out again?” said Andrew. “Already?”  
  
Patrick had staggered home in the small hours of the morning, delirious with exhaustion, and he’d barely managed to get his shoes off before he passed out in his clothes. He’d slept for about four hours - troubled, wakeful sleep, riddled with bad dreams like rotten wood - before getting up to do it all over again. “Yeah,” he said, his voice still thick and sleepy. He wasn’t going to be much use in this state, but it was better than nothing. “I have to.”  
  
Andrew sidled into view, cradling an irate-looking Princess in his arms. “You’re tearing this family apart, Patrick,” he said. He held out Princess, as if to prove a point. Her tail was twitching from side to side, and her eyes were narrowed. She tolerated Andrew’s attention only because she knew better than to bite the hand that fed her. “Won’t you think of the children?”  
  
Patrick managed a weak laugh as he laced up his shoes. He should have washed - he could smell himself, sharp and sour like stale sweat - but there was no time. A clean shirt would have to be good enough. His reflection in the mirror in the hall looked gaunt and pale, dirty hair and deeply-shadowed eyes. He looked away. “I’ll be back later. I promise I’ll eat something between now and then.”  
  
Andrew wasn’t mollified. “My mother warned me about you,” he said, following Patrick to the door.  
  
Patrick pushed it open, letting a blast of cold air in from the hallway. “Bye, Andrew.”  
  
“I want a divorce!” Andrew called after him, as the door swung closed again.  
  
Patrick took the elevator down to the lobby and stepped out into the thin, gray light of the early morning. If he took the subway, he’d be at Pete’s house before he left for the office. Ever since that awful night when it had all come out, Patrick had been following him to and from work - at a safe distance, of course - to make sure he wasn’t being followed by anyone else. He looked down at his watch and swore under his breath; he shouldn’t have slept so late. He sank his hands into his pockets, and walked a little faster.

 

*

 

Patrick had gone back home to sleep for a few hours while Pete was at work, figuring that he’d be safe in his office with people all around him, and headed back out to see Pete safely home at the end of the day. Andrew had made him a sandwich and hung around in the kitchen to make sure he ate it, which Patrick thought was a touching gesture given Andrew’s obvious disapproval of the whole endeavour.  
  
“Patrick,” he’d said, as Patrick had sat at the table, wolfing it down, suddenly ravenous. “You can’t keep doing this, buddy, you’re running yourself ragged. Sooner or later, you’re going to slip up.”  
  
Patrick had groaned, and rubbed his eyes. They’d felt gritty and sore. “I know,” he’d said. “I _know_ , but what am I supposed to do? If I back off he’ll be dead in a week.”  
  
Andrew hadn’t argued with that, and Patrick had gone to look for his coat and scarf.  
  
Patrick had shadowed Pete’s journey home without incident, and then he’d stood in the cold, just watching the house. He hoped to god that the last time had scared Pete enough that he’d learnt to lock his goddamn windows. He felt weak, wrung out, shaky with cold and exhaustion and hunger. He watched the drapes twitch shut in an upstairs window - the study, he was sure, Pete was obviously working late - and his heart ached. Just for a moment, he was possessed by the urge to cross the street, knock on the door, ask to come inside.  
  
He dismissed the thought, suddenly angry with himself. Wishing wouldn’t get him anywhere. He needed to go home. He walked slowly, dragging his feet, barely able to keep his eyes open. God, he wanted to go to bed. Maybe if he asked nicely enough, Andrew might take a shift or two.  
  
He took a seat on subway, feeling like a sleepwalker. Most people had left work hours ago, and the carriage was almost empty. He dozed for a little while, his head falling back against the window, and barely woke up in time to stumble back out and onto the platform at his stop. It wasn’t far from the subway station to his and Andrew’s apartment, and he set out with renewed determination, thinking of his bed.  
  
Up ahead of Patrick, a figure stepped out of the mouth of an alleyway. “Hey, buddy. You got a light?”  
  
If Patrick hadn’t been so goddamn tired, he might have heard the alarm bells ringing. “Sorry,” he said, as he pushed past. “I’m afraid not. I’m late for--”  
  
“Oh, I think you’ve got a minute to chat, Mr. Stump.” A hand shot out and grabbed Patrick around the wrist, yanking him back. For a split second, he was in another alley, another city, another life, back when the only illegal thing he’d ever done was look at a boy the wrong way.  
  
“Look,” he said, fighting back the panic and trying to wrench his arm free. “I think you’ve got the wrong guy, I just play music in a bar--”  
  
The man in front of Patrick smiled, his face shadowed by the peak of a flat cap. He wasn’t a big guy, but he was lean and wiry and he carried himself like a boxer. “Sure you are. And I’m just a guy who works in my cousin’s shoe factory.”  
  
The first blow caught Patrick in the stomach and he doubled over, all the air leaving his lungs at once. Tell him whatever you have to, he thought, as he struggled for breath. Tell this bastard whatever he wants to hear and pray it’ll be enough. He reached blindly for his pocket, for the knife he hoped to god was in there.  
  
“I wouldn’t do that, if I were you,” said the guy, evenly. He caught Patrick’s hand before it could reach his pocket and slammed it against the rough brick wall of the alley. Pain exploded all the way up Patrick’s arm and something in his hand snapped, clean and sharp and horrible, and he bit back a high, thin whine. He needed to get away. He knew he could hold his own in a fight - he’d had to do it before - but he also knew when he was outclassed. As soon as could breathe again, he’d run.  
  
“You got yourself into this mess, Mr. Stump, if you don’t mind my saying so.” The man began to roll up his sleeves, exposing heavily tattooed forearms. “It’s the customer’s right if he wants to take his business elsewhere. You shouldn’t have kept on interfering.”  
  
And Patrick thought, oh god, the hit, this is about Pete. Worse, it smacked of mob business, and Patrick could almost see how it all fitted together, but then another punch snapped his head back, and he didn’t think a goddamn thing until the flashbulbs behind his eyes stopped going off. That had been more than just bone, he’d felt the kiss of brass knuckles. He wanted to hit back, he wanted to run, but he couldn’t think, couldn’t move, couldn’t hear himself over the tearing of the breath in his lungs.  
  
“Listen,” he panted, struggling to straighten up. His head was pounding and his hand was on fire. “Listen, I didn’t mean to-- I’ll back off. Message received.”  
  
The guy clicked his tongue impatiently. “Shit. For a button man, you ain’t too sharp. You’re not being sent a message.” He hit Patrick again, and Patrick felt his nose break with a sick, horrible crunch. “You _are_ the message.”

 

*

 

When Patrick came around, he was in the back seat of a car, his head lolling against the window. The pain hit him a moment later, huge and suffocating, but he bit his tongue and kept quiet.  
  
“Jesus, Frankie. You weren’t supposed to kill him.” The voice came from the driver’s seat. Patrick didn’t open his eyes. He wasn’t sure he could have spoken if he wanted to.  
  
Next to him, someone kicked at the back of the front seat. “Asshole, does he look dead to you?”  
  
Patrick drew a cautious, shallow breath and whimpered when the awful tightness in his chest intensified. No, he wasn’t dead, but he had one foot in the grave. Worse, now that he’d heard the name, he had an awful feeling that he knew exactly who was in the car with him. If he was right - if it was Iero - then this was mob business after all, and it was looking more and more likely that he was going to end up in the Hudson with pockets full of stones before the night was out.  
  
The man in the front seat grunted, unimpressed. “Lucky the boss is sweet on you.”  
  
“Damn right he is. Shut up and drive the fucking car.”  
  
They drove in silence, until Patrick had no idea where they were. He was trying to think, but it wasn’t easy. It felt like something had been knocked loose in his head, his thoughts slippery and uncooperative. Whoever they were, they were under orders to keep him alive - but why? What did Patrick have that they wanted? He didn’t know.  
  
The car pulled up, the engine still humming, and the man in the back seat with Patrick opened his door and dragged him out onto the sidewalk. Rough hands shoved Patrick up a set of stairs and he stumbled, righting himself out of sheer desperation not to fall. The man who’d hauled Patrick out of the car knocked smartly on the door and then clapped Patrick on the shoulder, and his knees almost buckled.  
  
“ _Buon’anima_ , Mr. Stump.”  
  
Patrick was dimly aware of a screech of tires behind him as the car drove away. He leant heavily on the wall, his eyes screwed shut, his head spinning. He couldn’t think. He couldn’t see. Everything was fogged with pain and he could feel unconsciousness lapping at him like waves on a beach. A short eternity later, there was a noise like a door swinging open, and Patrick looked up. One of his eyes was swollen shut and he couldn’t see much out of the other one, either, but he was almost sure he was dead.  
  
“You don’t look like I thought you would,” said Patrick to the figure in the doorway, through his busted lip and his broken nose and the godawful throbbing in his head and the sharp pain in the hinge of his jaw.  
  
“Son of a bitch,” said Saint Peter. He hauled Patrick bodily through the pearly gates and slammed them shut behind him. Patrick swayed on his feet for a moment, then his knees gave out and he slid to the floor.  
  
“If this is heaven,” he slurred, “It fucking stinks.”  
  
The pain surged, and everything went black. After a long moment, heaven resolved itself into the familiar shape of Pete’s kitchen. Pete was kneeling next to him on the tiles, carefully peeling his bloodied shirt away from his body. Patrick experienced a profoundly strange moment of déjà vu, snapped back to the last time he’d been in this room, when there had been another bloody body on the floor and he’d been the one leaning down over it.  
  
“Pete?” croaked Patrick. If this was it, he thought, clinging desperately to consciousness, if this was it, if he was a goner, there were things Pete needed to know.  
  
“Shh, shh,” said Pete, distractedly, still working at the buttons on Patrick’s shirt. He was breathing hard, and his mouth was set in a grim line. “Just - stay still, okay? I need to see where you’re bleeding. Oh, fuck, Patrick, what did you _do?_ ”  
  
Patrick gagged. Blood from his nose (broken, he was sure) was running down his throat, choking him. “Pete--”  
  
“I’ve got you, you’re going to be alright.” The hands that pulled Patrick’s shirt open were shaking. “Oh, god.”  
  
Patrick didn’t know what Pete was seeing, what could have made his voice crack like that. Patrick hadn’t thought Iero had anything but the knuckle dusters on him, but it was possible that he’d been stabbed and hadn’t felt it through the adrenaline and the pain in his hand and his ribs and his head. He struggled to sit up and collapsed but back down again, a weak sob escaping him. Never, in all his years as a small-time con artist and hired killer, had he been so scared. He was dying, and instead of receding, the pain was only getting worse.  
  
“You’re not dying,” said Pete, unsteadily, and Patrick realized that he must have been thinking out loud. “But someone worked you over pretty good. I need to get you upstairs and clean some of this mess off. You think you can stand?”  
  
Patrick shook his head.  
  
“Okay. Okay. Give me a second.”  
  
Patrick felt the world lurch dizzily around him and he coughed, more blood spattering on his chest. He could feel Pete’s arms around him. “Pete, what--”  
  
“You can’t walk, and you can’t lie there bleeding on the floor all night,” said Pete, tightly, starting towards the stairs. Every step was agony, jolting Patrick’s body and sending fresh shocks of pain tearing through him. After what felt like hours, Pete lowered Patrick onto a soft bed, propping his head up on a pillow.  
  
“Alright,” said Pete, running one bloody hand through his hair. “I’m gonna… I have to call someone, he’ll know what to do. You hold on. I won’t be long.”  
  
He left the room, his footsteps receding down the hallway. Patrick closed his eyes and tried to breathe, feeling all the places that were hot and painful, trying to work out which ones were potentially fatal, wondering how badly he was still bleeding. Time kept on weaving in and out of focus, but it didn’t feel like long before Pete came back with a bowl of hot water and a towel.  
  
“My friend’s on his way,” he said. “He’s a doctor. He’ll fix you up. I’m just going to clean some of this off, alright? Stay with me, Patrick.”  
  
Patrick tried to say _thank you_ , but it came out as a wordless, broken noise. Pete’s hands were gentle, wiping away the blood. It felt good, felt safe, and Patrick shut his eyes again and let the darkness close over him.  
  
The next thing he knew, a voice somewhere nearby was saying, “For fuck’s _sake_ , Pete. You’re too old to be calling me at two in the morning, you know that? I swear, I heard your voice on the phone and my heart nearly stopped. Are you--you know I don’t like to ask, but…”  
  
“I’ve been taking the damn pills,” Pete snapped, and Patrick heard him push the bedroom door open. “You’re not here for me.”  
  
There was a short, shocked intake of breath, Patrick cracked one eye open. A man with a lot of dark, curly hair was standing over him. His shirt was buttoned crookedly, as if he’d dressed in a hurry.  
  
“Is he…” said Pete, in a very small voice, “Is he going to be okay?”  
  
“I don’t know,” murmured Pete’s friend. “Hey, buddy. My name’s Joe, I’m a doctor. Let’s take a look at you.”  
  
Patrick drifted in and out as the doctor examined him. His hands were gentle, but Patrick felt so fragile that even the lightest touch was painful.  
  
“Broken ribs. One, two... three. They’ll heal by themselves but they’re going to hurt like hell until they do. Ice them, and keep him upright as much as you can. These contusions look like… knuckle dusters? What the hell have you gotten yourself into this time, Pete? Let’s take a look at that hand.”  
  
He took Patrick’s hand and examined it. Patrick whimpered, and the doctor tutted. “That’s a brawler’s fracture if I ever saw one. Fifth metacarpal. Bruised knuckles, too. You put up a fight, huh, buddy? This hand’s swelling already. Ice that too, and elevate it. I’ll splint it before I go. The split lip and the busted eyebrow look bad, head wounds always bleed a lot, but they’re not serious. Clean them up with iodine and let them heal. You’ll have to reset that nose, though, I know you still remember how to do that.” He looked back over his shoulder at Pete. “Nasty, but not deadly. He’s hit his head, though, more than once. _That’s_ what I’m worried about. Keep him awake for the next six hours. You’re watching for any significant drop in alertness.”  
  
“Why?”  
  
“Because that could mean the brain is hemorrhaging. You see that happening, _you take him to a hospital_. I’m not kidding, Pete, I don’t care who he is or what he’s done. Pay the doctors off if you have to, just get him seen. He should really go to the emergency room anyway, but I’m guessing you had a damn good reason for getting me out of bed in the middle of the night.” He sighed. “As long as his head’s okay, he’ll live, but the next few weeks are going to be rough. I’m going to go and find something I can splint his hand with while you reset his nose.”  
  
Joe left the room, and Pete stepped up to the bed.  
  
“Alright,” said Pete, his voice still unsteady. He swallowed, and rolled up his bloodied sleeves. “Let’s get that nose fixed up, huh?  
  
Patrick, who had once had to reset Andrew’s broken nose in their little bathroom, knew what came next. It had to be done, and quickly, before the swelling made it impossible.  
  
“Here.” Pete held out the red-stained towel he’d used to clean Patrick up. “Blow.”  
  
Patrick gritted his teeth and blew his nose into the towel. The pain made his head swim, and he wondered for a moment whether he was going to pass out. Pete tossed the towel away, heedless of the large patch of fresh blood in the middle. He pressed his fingertips together, making a triangle, and cupped his hands around Patrick’s nose.  
  
“Alright,” he murmured, his eyebrows drawing together as he frowned, concentrating. “Ready?”  
  
“As I’ll ever be. Do it.”  
  
“Be brave. Deep breath, now.”  
  
Patrick inhaled, steeling himself. As he breathed out again, Pete dragged his hands down towards Patrick’s chin, straightening his nose.  
  
“ _Fuck!_ Oh, goddamn son of a bitch, Jesus fucking--cocksucking _Christ._ ” Patrick didn’t swear often, but the pain was unbelievable. His eyes were watering, and a wave of horrible, dizzy nausea swept over him. God, he hoped he wasn’t going to puke. He was sure that would have finished him off.  
  
“Nearly there,” said Pete, grimly. “Just one more time, Patrick. You think you can do that?”  
  
The honest answer was no - Patrick would have begged if he’d been able to get the words out - but Pete was already lining his hands up for another try. It was just as bad the second time around, and Patrick made an awful, broken noise somewhere between a choked sob and a shout.  
  
“Good as new,” said Pete. He smiled, but it looked brittle and it didn’t quite reach his eyes.  
  
“Thanks,” Patrick said, weakly. His eyes were still wet and his nose felt red hot, throbbing painfully. He’d broken out in a cold sweat.  
  
“Any time.” Pete carefully mopped up the blood still trickling from Patrick’s nose and sat back down in the chair by the bed.  
  
Patrick looked at him properly for the first time, taking him in. He looked thinner than Patrick remembered, his eyes hollow and ringed by thick, dark shadows, his hair unwashed. He looked like it had been days since he’d slept, and longer still since he’d shaved.  
  
“Hey,” croaked Patrick. “You look like hell.”  
  
Pete laughed, short and mirthless, and rubbed his eyes. “Yeah, I haven’t been doing so good,” he said. “Some asshole broke my heart, you see.”  
  
Patrick’s chest felt tight. “Pete--”  
  
Then the door swung open and Joe reappeared, and Patrick fell silent.  
  
“Alright,” said Joe, as Pete moved out of the way to let him get to Patrick. “I see you’ve fixed his nose. It’s still going to swell, but it should heal up nice and straight now. I’m going to splint your hand, it’s going to hurt a hell of a lot less once it’s been immobilized.”  
  
Patrick allowed Joe to take his hand, and he began to strap it up in a makeshift splint.  
  
“I can give him some Novocaine for now, that ought to take the edge off,” said Joe. He was looking down, intently focussed on Patrick’s bruised, swollen hand, but he was talking to Pete. “He needs morphine, really, the poor bastard - I’ll write him a prescription, you’ll have to pick it up - but it’ll make him drowsy, alright, so he’s not to start on that until he’s been awake at least six hours. You’ll want to pick up some more Novocaine and some aspirin while you’re at the drugstore, too. He’s going to need it.”  
  
“Alright.” Pete rubbed his eyes and the line of his shoulders had relaxed, just a little bit. “I think I’ve got it all. Thank you, Joe.”  
  
“You owe me,” said Joe. “You owe me _big time_ , Wentz, and don’t you forget it.” His face softened as he shook Pete’s hand. “I was never here, alright? I don’t know who this guy is or what kind of trouble he’s in - don’t you dare tell me, I don’t want to know - but I hope he pulls through.”  
  
Joe left, but not before dosing Patrick with Novocaine and leaving some more for him to take later. Patrick felt desperately, pathetically grateful. He lay back against all the pillows Pete had been able to find, amongst the bloodied sheets. They were ruined, he thought, with a faraway, unfocused sense of guilt.  
  
Pete had gone back downstairs to see Joe out, but after a minute he came back and settled himself in the chair by the bed.  
  
“You don’t have to stay,” Patrick croaked. “I can… I’ll stay awake, I swear. You can go back to bed.”  
  
Pete made a noise that was almost a laugh. “I don’t think so. I’m staying right here.”  
  
“You’re supposed to be mad at me,” said Patrick, quietly. The Novocaine was starting to do its work already, and he felt strangely weightless. It wasn’t that the pain was gone, exactly, but it was happening to someone else, a very long way away.  
  
“Oh, I’m fucking furious. But I could do without having a dead man in my bed, if it’s all the same to you,” said Pete. “I’d be no good at all in prison.”  
  
Patrick tried to laugh, but it came out as a weak cough. It didn’t hurt so much to talk anymore, now he was doped up, but he found himself having to concentrate hard just to get the words out in the right order. Still, Patrick thought, if Pete wanted answers, he owed him that much. “You might surprise yourself. I did.”  
  
Pete laughed, too, and then Patrick watched it die on his face as what he’d said sunk in. “Oh. So you did some time, huh?”  
  
“Yeah. But never for-- just little stuff,” Patrick finished, awkwardly. The first time had been back in Chicago, when two guys had jumped Patrick outside a bar, maybe for money he didn’t have or for the redheaded boy he hadn’t even managed to take home. One of them had walked away from the fight. The other one hadn’t. Patrick had had a clean record, and he’d served three years for manslaughter, committed in self-defence. The second time had been in New York, not long after he and Andrew had started running the occasional scam to make ends meet. They’d botched a simple confidence trick and gotten caught.  
  
“Oh,” said Pete, again. He went quiet, evidently lost for words. After a minute, he said, “So how did you wind up, uh…”  
  
Patrick sighed. He wished the story was something dramatic, something romantic, something that made him sound like a tortured soul or a broken hero in pursuit of vengeance, but the reality was a sad, grubby thing. “I could give you the Hollywood version,” he said, “But honestly? It was January in New York and our heat had been shut off. You remember the winter back in fifty-two? Me and Andy were already sleeping in the same bed - nothing funny. I mean, god, how could it have been?”  
  
Patrick still remembered it, his forehead resting on Andrew’s shoulder, Andrew’s hands on his chest, both of them gritting their teeth every time the draught shook the loose window panes. Patrick had been haunted by the ghost of his childhood asthma that winter, his chest tight and painful, rattling every time he drew a breath. They’d wanted to start over, make honest money as musicians. But, as they’d found out before long, it wasn’t easy to get a steady job in a nice place with a criminal record. They’d both kept on playing wherever they could, grifting on the side, but it had been hard. By the time they’d gotten the call, offering them more money than they’d seen in years for one quick, dirty job, it hadn’t been much of a choice.  
  
Pete opened his mouth to speak, but the doorbell rang before he could get the words out. They both froze, Patrick barely daring to breathe. Slowly, Pete got to his feet.  
  
“Pete, don’t,” hissed Patrick. “You don’t know who it could be, you could get yourself hurt--”  
  
It was no good. Pete was already out of the door. Swearing under his breath, Patrick carefully levered himself up and off the bed. He had to pause and catch his breath, leaning heavily on the wall while he waited for his head to stop spinning, then he gritted his teeth and staggered over to the door and down the hallway. Supporting himself on the banister, he limped down the stairs. There was blood on the floor, he noticed, from when Pete had brought him inside earlier. All he’d done, it seemed, was make a mess of Pete’s life.  
  
The man on the doorstep was haloed in the light from the streetlamps, his features indistinct, but Pete obviously recognized him. He froze. “Mikey,” he said, after a long moment, and several things fell into place with a noise like the cocking of a gun. Patrick felt ready to pass out again. _Mikey Way_. Patrick had thought he’d recognized those deep, dark eyes. Their faces were different, and Mikey had managed to keep his out of the papers, but his eyes were like Gerard’s. Mikey was stepped inside, shrugging off his coat like he knew the house well.  
  
“It’s been… Mikey, it’s been years. What are you doing here?” Pete said, softly. He had his back to Patrick, but Patrick knew that wide-eyed, wondering voice. What the hell was going on? If it had been Iero who’d worked Patrick over earlier (and he was almost sure it had), then it was the Way family who wanted Pete dead, but the Ways themselves didn’t usually do their own dirty work. So what _was_ Mikey doing here alone and apparently unarmed?  
  
“I came to warn you,” said Mikey, in a tight, urgent voice. He reached for Pete’s hand but hesitated, his fingertips still a few inches away from Pete’s. After a minute, Mikey’s hand fell back to his side. “I couldn’t use the phone, it’s not safe. Listen, you--” Mikey stopped. He’d seen Patrick. Patrick stood, paralyzed like a rabbit in the headlights of a truck, his heart hammering. If Mikey didn’t already know who he was, it wouldn’t be long before he figured it out. Patrick wanted to run, but he wasn’t even sure he had the strength to get back up to Pete’s bedroom by himself. “Hello, Patrick,” Mikey said, quietly. “I’m not here for you. You can go.”  
  
That was a relief, even if Patrick still wasn’t sure what was happening. “I’d love to,” he said, weakly. “Really, I’d hate to interrupt. But, uh, I’m not sure I can walk that far.” He was clinging to the banister so tightly that his knuckles were white, and he was struggling to keep himself upright.  
  
Mikey looked at him for a long moment. He was tall and thin, and with his head on one side and his steady, unnerving gaze, he reminded Patrick uncomfortably of some sort of bird. A crow, maybe. Eventually, he shrugged - an odd, jerky movement - and returned his attention to Pete. “I shouldn’t even be here,” he said. “Pete, you have no idea how much shit I’m in if anyone finds out.”  
  
“Does Gee know you’re here?” Pete asked. Mikey said nothing, and apparently that was enough of an answer for Pete. He groaned, and pinched the bridge of his nose. “Jesus Christ, Mikes.”  
  
Gerard, Patrick realised, with an awful lurching feeling in the pit of his stomach. Pete was talking about Gerard. Patrick had been doing his own time in Chicago when Gerard had been arrested in New York in connection with a string of bloody murders associated with the Way family business. Gerard had even made it into the papers. He’d been a war hero, arrested on circumstantial evidence. Patrick didn’t doubt that he was guilty, if even half of the stories about him were true - he’d most likely ordered the killings, at the very least - but somehow, the cops had never managed to make anything stick, and he’d been released before the week was out. If the Ways themselves were involved, this was big league stuff. Patrick and Andrew had survived as long as they had doing what they did precisely because they kept away from this sort of thing. Patrick was beginning to realize that he was hopelessly out of his depth.  
  
“ _Listen_ ,” said Mikey. “You need to get out of town, I can’t keep them off your back. They’re not going to stop.”  
  
Pete sighed. “Look,” he said. “I appreciate what you’re doing for me. I know you’ve got a lot to lose. But I can’t just… up and leave, Mikey, I’ve got a company to run.”  
  
“So hand it over to someone else, unless you really think it’s worth dying for,” said Mikey, shortly. “They’re going to have you killed. I don’t know when, but it’s going to happen sooner or later. Look at your boy, if you don’t believe me.”  
  
Pete looked back over his shoulder at Patrick. He looked helpless, torn. “I _can’t_ ,” he said.

Mikey made an irritated noise and looked down at his watch. “I don’t have all day,” he said. “They’re going to realize I’m gone. Pete, you have to listen to me. I wouldn’t be here if it wasn’t serious.”

“No,” said Pete, quietly. “I guess you wouldn’t.”  
  
It might have been Patrick’s imagination, but he thought he saw Mikey flinch. When he spoke again, though, his voice was as low and even as ever. “What can I say to make you take this seriously?”  
  
“I am taking it seriously,” said Pete. “But I can’t drop everything and run. You know I can’t.”  
  
Mikey looked disappointed, but not surprised. “Yeah,” he said. “I thought you might say that.” He sighed, and looked at his watch again. “I can see I’m not going to change your mind, and I can’t stay.” He hesitated, then turned towards the door.  
  
Pete stood, frozen, for a moment, then said, “Hey.” Mikey turned back, right on the doorstep, his face unguarded and sad. “This is the last time, isn’t it? I’m not going to see you again.”  
  
“I don’t think so,” Mikey said, softly. “I’m sorry, Pete.” He looked as if he had something else to say, but he seemed to change his mind. He closed the door behind him and was gone. Pete dropped his head into his hands, rubbing his eyes.  
  
“Mikey Way, Pete?” said Patrick, leaning heavily on the banister for support but unable to keep quiet any longer. “ _Mikey Way?_ ”  
  
“Come on,” Pete said, wearily. “You shouldn’t be out of bed.”  
  
Patrick let Pete help him back up the stairs. He didn’t have the strength to resist. Pete lifted him up onto the bed, and Patrick lay back while Pete rearranged the pillows around him. God, everything fucking hurt. He wanted that morphine.  
  
“I’m waiting,” he said, once he was finally settled. “Mikey Way, Pete. Explain.”  
  
“Seriously, you want to do this now? Can’t it wait until the morning?”  
  
“Pete,” said Patrick, flatly. “I was nearly killed tonight for what I’ve done for you. Yes, I want to do this now.”  
  
Pete blanched. “Alright. Alright,” he said, looking down at his hands. “We knew each other, a long time ago. Just after the war. I came home and the business was wrecked. I thought it was too late to save it, it looked like we were going to fold. I was desperate.”  
  
“Go on,” said Patrick, grimly.  
  
“And the Ways came to me, and they said they could help. They just needed me to move some stock for them. Perfectly legal, they said.” He laughed, shortly. “I think I knew, really, even then. But I… turned a blind eye. People were losing their jobs because we couldn’t afford to pay their wages. The Ways had enough money to give me a little breathing room - enough to get things back on track. A short term arrangement, they said.”  
  
Patrick closed his eyes. “Oh, Pete.”  
  
“I know, I know, but I was… my back was against the wall, Patrick, what was I supposed to do? Anyway, they held up their end, and I got to know them, a little. Me and Mikey were… close.”  
  
“Close?” said Patrick, incredulously. “ _Close_ , Pete? What’s that supposed to--oh.”  
  
“Yeah,” Pete said, tilting his chin up defiantly and meeting Patrick’s eyes. “And you can get down off your high horse, you’re no saint. So I fucked him, so what. At least he never lied to me.” Pete didn’t speak for a minute, like he was choosing his words carefully. Then - “I know what he is,” he said, quietly, sadly. “I know what he’s done. Just--you have to know he wasn’t always that. When he was mine he was just a skinny kid with a sweet smile.”  
  
Patrick hesitated, then said, “You loved him, huh?”  
  
Pete huffed a laugh. “I guess I did. It wasn’t forever, but… yeah. I guess I did.”  
  
“So how come the Ways want you dead now? Why not years ago?”  
  
“They… got in touch, a few months back,” said Pete. “Generous fee, no questions asked.”  
  
Patrick sucked a breath through his teeth. He was starting to see the shape of it now. “What did they want you to move?”  
  
Pete shrugged. “I don’t know. Guns? Dope? They’ve got their hands in all kinds of things these days. I said no, I didn’t want to owe them. Anyway, they’re bigger than they were ten years ago. For all I know, there might be a rat telling the cops who they’re doing business with. You think I did the wrong thing?”  
  
“I think it would have been the wrong thing no matter what you’d done,” said Patrick, honestly. “Say yes and you’re in their pocket, say no and you’re a liability. Damned if you do, damned if you don’t. You should have seen it coming.”  
  
“Yeah. I guess I hoped Mikey might… I don’t know.” Pete sighed. “Ancient history, I suppose, no use crying about it now. Here we are.”  
  
“For what it’s worth,” said Patrick, quietly. “I think he’s been trying. I mean, first it was me, and then the others, and then this.” He gestured at his own battered body. “You know what kind of horsepower they’ve got at their disposal, they could have had you killed five times over by now.”  
  
Pete’s expression froze, like it had jammed. After a moment, he let out a brittle, strangled laugh, his eyes too bright. “Well,” he said. “What do you know, huh? He remembers after all.”  
  
Patrick ached for him. How many times, he wondered, could one heart break? He wished there was something he could do, but he wasn’t sure he had the nerve to try.  
  
“Run away with me,” he said, softly. He’d meant to work up to it, but the words had tumbled out before he could stop them.  
  
Pete stopped. For a long moment, he was quiet. Then, in a small voice, “Patrick, I don’t…”  
  
“Listen, you have to disappear,” Patrick said, urgently, making an effort to sit up. “I can’t protect you forever. Even Mikey can’t protect you forever, he said so himself. You can’t stay here, Pete. You know exactly who’s after you and what they’re capable of. It’s only a matter of time before they send someone nastier than me. They’re going to give up on the hacks sooner or later and then it’s going to be the Ways’ personal attack dog, and you’ve seen what he can do. Hell, it might even be Toro.”  
  
Pete flinched. “I’ll think about it,” he said. “I can’t promise you anything, but… let me think about it, okay?”  
  
“Okay.” It was better than nothing. Maybe the moon was made of cheese and maybe stubborn, pig-headed Pete would come around. “Hey,” said Patrick, as a thought struck him. “So you’ve met Gerard, right? What’s he like?”  
  
Pete shrugged. “You know what he’s like. Dark hair. A little taller than me.”  
  
“I know what he _looks_ like.” Patrick rolled his eyes, then regretted it when it hurt. “What’s _he_ like?”  
  
Pete hesitated. “Alright,” he said, after a moment. “It’s like this. So you’re just talking to him about, you know, last week’s baseball game, right? And he’s just… this guy. You know what he looks like, you’ve seen the photographs. He talks with his hands. He likes old silent movies. And you just - forget. You forget who he is. Then you see it, just out of the corner of your eye, and you remember, but the scary thing is how you still forget, every time. You have these ideas, I guess, about what a mob boss should look like, how a guy like that should act, and he’s just… not that. He was an altar boy, did you know that? Him and Mikey. They still go to church on Sundays.”  
  
Patrick felt his skin crawl. Picturing the Ways as altar boys was somehow doubly disturbing when you’d seen some of the things that had been done on their orders. Thankfully, the doorbell rang again at that moment, sparing him any further thoughts about the Ways.  
  
Pete groaned. “What _now?_ It’s like Times Square in here tonight,” he muttered, getting to his feet. “I’ll be right back, okay? I’m not kidding, Patrick, _stay here_ this time.”  
  
“Alright,” Patrick murmured. He wasn’t sure he could have gotten up again even if he’d wanted to. As the Novocaine worked, his limbs were feeling increasingly distant and the thought of coordinating all of them at once was daunting. He listened, though, straining to hear as Pete went back downstairs to see who it was. Distantly, Patrick heard the door swing open.  
  
“Mr. Constantine!” came Pete’s faint voice. Patrick sat up, straining to hear. Constantine had been Andrew’s alias for that first meeting at the bar. “What a surprise! You never call, you never write! I gotta tell you, I’ve been a real mess. It’s not right, you know, stringing a poor gal along like this.”  
  
“Yeah, yeah,” snapped Andrew’s voice. “Is he here? Is he alright?”  
  
Patrick slumped back, dizzy with relief. He wouldn’t have been able to live with himself if something had happened to Andrew because of him. The voices were getting louder, and Patrick could hear footsteps on the stairs. Andrew threw open the bedroom door, wild-eyed and frantic, and shut it again in Pete’s face.  
  
“ _Patrick_ ,” he said, crossing the room in two long strides and dropping to his knees by the side of the bed. “My god, what did they do to you?”  
  
“I’m okay,” said Patrick, levering himself upright and grimacing. “Andrew, I--”  
  
“You _idiot_ ,” said Andrew. He laughed, but there was an edge of hysteria to it. “God, I’m glad you’re alive. You stupid son of a bitch. You never came home, I thought… who was it, what the hell happened?”  
  
“Iero happened,” Patrick said, wearily. “It’s alright, it was only a warning shot. It could have been worse.”  
  
Andrew had gone very white. “ _Iero?_ ”  
  
“Yeah. Apparently my, uh… interfering hasn’t gone unnoticed.”  
  
“Christ,” said Andrew. Patrick could see him putting it all together. “We’ve been working for the Ways this whole time, haven’t we? God fucking damn it. And _this_ is the job you go rogue on?” he shook his head. “You really know how to pick ‘em.”  
  
Something of what Patrick was feeling must have shown on his face, because Andrew’s voice softened slightly.  
  
“Oh, Patrick, I told you not to get involved.”  
  
“You did. And I went and did it anyway.”  
  
Andrew looked at him for a long moment. “You’re all in on this one, huh?”  
  
Patrick smiled, feeling the sting as his busted lip opened up and started to bleed sluggishly again. “Yeah,” he said, quietly. “I’m, uh. I’m pretty gone for him.”  
  
“You need to get him out of here.”  
  
“I know.” Patrick groaned, dropping his head back against the pillows. “I tried to tell him. _Mikey goddamn Way_ tried to tell him, and will he listen?”  
  
“Mikey-- _the_ Mikey Way? He was _here?_ ”  
  
“It’s a long story,” said Patrick. “Andrew, I don’t know what to do.”  
  
“I’m sorry,” Andrew said, and he sounded like he meant it.  
  
“Yeah.” Patrick’s breath caught in his throat and he coughed, feeling it in all the places that were broken.  
  
“I’ll go get you want some water,” said Andrew.  
  
“Thanks.”  
  
“Won’t be long.” He got up to leave, and Patrick slumped down into the mountain of bedding. God, everything was in such a mess. At least Pete was speaking to him again.  
  
“Patrick?”  
  
He looked up to see Pete standing in the doorway. Patrick tried to smile, then stopped when he realized that it was almost certainly making him look even more gruesome than he already did. “Hey, Pete.”  
  
“Hi.” Pete looked wary, uncertain, but he came over to the bed and sat back down in the chair he’d left there earlier. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to eavesdrop, but… you mean all that stuff you said?”  
  
“Yeah,” said Patrick, quietly. “I’m afraid so. Sorry, I guess.” Sorry about all of it, he thought. Sorry it’s all such a godawful mess, sorry I couldn’t kill you when I goddamn had to, sorry I ruined it all, sorry I went and fell in love with you.  
  
“You never said,” Pete whispered. He looked so raw, so vulnerable, that Patrick wanted to look away. The way Pete lived - heart on his sleeve, feelings written all over his face - was so strange to Patrick, exhilarating and terrifying. Pete let out a short, sharp breath that was almost a laugh, and said, helplessly, “You didn’t look like trouble.”  
  
Patrick sighed, and took Pete’s hand with his uninjured one. “We never do,” he said. “That’s the trick.” They stayed there like that, holding hands, neither of them speaking, for a long moment. Patrick watched Pete’s face, tired and unshaven but softened by the dim light, and his heart ached.  
  
“Let’s go,” said Pete, suddenly, and it took Patrick a moment to catch up.  
  
“Go?”  
  
“Wherever you want. Anywhere.” He squeezed Patrick’s hand. “Let’s run away.”  
  
“I--Pete, are you sure? We’ll have to stay gone, we can’t come back. You’ve got your friends, your family, your business…”  
  
“I can tell my family, right?”  
  
“If you… yeah, I guess so,” said Patrick, wrongfooted by the sudden lack of resistance. “Once we’ve gone, maybe, but yeah, I don’t see why not. Hell, they could visit. And you’ll be able to write.”  
  
Just then, the door swung open and Andrew reappeared with a glass of water in his hand. Patrick let go of Pete’s hand, but Andrew had seen.  
  
“What did I miss?” he said, with interest. He gave Patrick the glass and he drank gratefully.  
  
“We’re leaving,” said Pete. Now that he’d made a decision, he sounded happier. “As soon as we can. I’d be a fool to ignore so much good advice.” He looked back at Patrick, who tried to smile.  
  
“Is that so? I’m glad to hear it,” said Andrew, clapping him on the shoulder. “Good man. If you’re smart about it, you might even survive.”  
  
Something struck Patrick and he groaned, his head falling back against the pillows. “I’m sorry, Andy,” he said “We’re going to lose that fifty grand.”  
  
Andrew had a calculating look on his face. “Not necessarily,” he said.  
  
Pete looked up at Andrew and something passed between them. They were the same, deep down, Patrick realized. Businessmen to the end, albeit Andrew in a left-handed sort of way. “You’re saying there’s a way you could still collect?” Pete said.  
  
“There is,” said Andrew. “But you’re not going to like it.”

 

*

 

At sundown, Pete and Andrew helped Patrick into the back seat of Pete’s Cadillac.  
  
“Let’s go,” said Andrew. “Before what’s in the trunk starts to smell.”  
  
Pete had wanted to drive his car one last time, so Andrew sat in the passenger seat and fed him the directions. The day had been a fever dream, thanks to the morphine, and Patrick remembered it only as confused, disjointed pieces: Andrew pacing back and forth as he thought out loud, Pete signing his last will and testament at the kitchen table, clothes being thrown haphazardly into a suitcase, hushed phone calls, Pete’s gun and a can of gasoline by the front door.  
  
They took the Lincoln Tunnel out west, so that it would look like they’d been trying to skip town when the car was found. Patrick drifted in and out as they sped through the gathering dusk, the pain blurry and remote. Pete turned on the radio as they drove through Hell’s Kitchen, and Johnny Cash’s voice filled the car. Patrick closed his eyes.  
  
He woke up a while later to Andrew’s hand on his knee, shaking him gently. “Patrick? Patrick, buddy, we’re here.”  
  
Patrick blinked, feeling groggy and disoriented. He didn’t know how long he’d been out or where they were, but night had fallen and they were by the side of an empty stretch of highway. Pete and Andrew opened their doors and climbed out, and Patrick followed, slowly and clumsily, hissing through his teeth when the movement pulled at his ribs. Andrew popped the Cadillac’s trunk open, and Pete made a low, involuntary noise. Andrew shot him a look.  
  
“Weren’t you a soldier?” he said. “I thought you’d have a stronger stomach.”  
  
“I was,” said Pete. “That’s sort of the problem.”  
  
“They’re dead, they can’t hurt you. And we borrowed them from the morgue, it’s not as if they had much to live for. Patrick’s in no state to do it, so you’re going to help me get these poor bastards into the front seats.”  
  
It was at times like this that Patrick was reminded that Andrew had been mixed up in this sort of thing since he was just a kid. Most of the time, that knowledge made Patrick deeply sad in an unfocused, uncomfortable sort of way, but today he was glad of it. He watched as Pete and Andrew manhandled the two corpses into the front seats. They didn’t look quite right, but they didn’t need to. By the time they were found, it would take a professional just to identify them as human. Andrew knew a guy in the coroner’s office who owed him one, and would sign death certificates declaring them to be Pete and Patrick. Patrick and Andrew had talked about it, once or twice, the notion that one day they might want to get out. What they hadn’t talked about was the likelihood that when that day came, it might be messy. Quietly, they’d both started to collect things - favors, contacts, tricks - that might help them get out alive if things got ugly. Andrew had been holding onto that one like an ace up his sleeve for years, Patrick knew, and he was touched that he was playing it for their sake.  
  
While Andrew retrieved the gasoline from the back seat, Pete took off his watch and fastened it around the dead man’s wrist. They’d left Pete’s gun in the glove compartment, and the body in the driver’s seat carried his zippo lighter too. When the police - or the Ways - came calling at Pete’s house, they’d find the closets thrown open, the safe emptied, things scattered everywhere, things of sentimental value notably absent.  
  
Andrew removed a half-full bottle of whiskey that he’d found in Pete’s liquor cabinet from the trunk and slammed it shut again. He walked back around to the driver’s side door and leant down, wedging the bottle on top of the gas pedal. “It’s going to break, but they’ll find the glass. If they think you were drinking, there won’t be any questions about why you came off the road,” he said, reaching inside to turn the key in the ignition. “It’s not pretty, but it’ll work.”  
  
He stood back and the wheels spun in the dirt for a moment. The three of them watched as the car roared off, fishtailing wildly, the engine screaming. Patrick looked away, but Pete didn’t seem to be able to.  
  
There was a colossal, splintering crash, and when Patrick looked up again, Pete’s awful, wonderful cherry red Cadillac was wrapped around a tree, maybe forty feet off the side of the road. Andrew strolled over to it with the canister in one and a book of matches in the other. They watched him as he doused the car’s creamy leather interior with gasoline, the sharp, heady scent of it carrying on the night breeze. When he was done, he stepped back and struck a match, and Patrick took Pete’s hand in his. For a moment, nothing happened, and then the flames caught with a soft _wumph_ , filling up the car and licking at the paint. Andrew turned his back on the burning car and walked back towards Pete and Patrick, silhouetted against the blaze.  
  
“Hey,” said Patrick, softly, to Pete. “Are you alright?”  
  
“Fine,” said Pete. “It’s only a car.” But his voice was tight. Patrick squeezed his hand, wishing there was something else he could do.  
  
When Andrew reached them, he withdrew a cigarette case from his pocket and took one for himself before offering it to Pete. He lit them both with another match, and the three of them watched the car as it burned. The smell was awful, hot metal and fuel underpinned by a note of something smokey that reminded Patrick, horribly, of summertime cookouts.  
  
“I miss the good old days,” said Andrew, after a while. “Things were simple back then, you know? Me and my friend Adam used to steal cars and drive out to Laguna Beach and smoke and watch the sun set. All we had to worry about was splitting before the cops caught up with us.”  
  
“You had a weird childhood, buddy,” Patrick told him, patting him on the shoulder with his good hand.  
  
“Hey, don’t I know it.” Andrew dropped his cigarette and ground it under his heel. “Are you ready?”

 

*

 

With the Cadillac wrecked, they’d had to walk back to the nearest town to pick up another car. It was the part Patrick had been dreading, but he’d leaned on Pete and Andrew and the morphine had smoothed the edges of the pain and turned it into something distant and abstract. He sat in the back seat, drifting in and out like a poorly tuned wireless.  
  
“You didn’t have to take me with you,” said Pete, quietly, as the stolen car sped along Route 440.  
  
“No,” Andrew agreed. “No offence. I’m sure you’re a stand-up guy. But you’re worth a lot more to me dead.”  
  
“Sure,” said Pete. “So why did you?”  
  
“Why do you think?” Andrew glanced back over his shoulder, towards Patrick. “Because you’re his shot at getting out of the game.”  
  
Pete said nothing, and they drove on in silence.  
  
“I’m taking you two to a motel,” said Andrew, a little while later. “You’ll have to lie low for a day or two while I go back to New York to see the Ways.”  
  
“What are you going to tell them?” Pete asked.  
  
Andrew shrugged, his eyes still fixed on the road ahead. “The truth,” he said. “Mostly. I’ll tell them all about how Patrick went rogue and how he’s been keeping you safe. But I’m going to let them think I wanted the money, so I took care of both of you. The Ways think I did it, the police can’t prove it wasn’t an accident and you two get out alive. Everybody wins.”  
  
From the back seat, Patrick could see that his knuckles were white on the steering wheel.  
  
“But only if they believe you,” said Pete, quietly.  
  
“Yeah.” Andrew was silent for a long moment. “There’s that.”

 

*

 

Patrick woke with a start, gasping. There was a hand on his shoulder. Pete’s. They’d arrived. After a moment, his breathing evened out. The pain in his ribs was fierce; he wanted more morphine. Out of the window, he could just about make out a neon _VACANCIES_ sign.  
  
“We’re here,” said Andrew. He looked exhausted. He was unshaven, his eyes deeply shadowed, and Patrick was almost sure there was gasoline in his hair. “Welcome to the Satellite Motel. I’d better do the talking, you’re both supposed to be dead men and we’d better not risk the receptionist recognizing Pete.”  
  
“She won’t recognize me, though,” Patrick said. “I’m alright, I can--”  
  
“She might not recognize you, but she’s sure as hell going to remember you if you walk in there looking like you went twelve rounds with Rocky Marciano.” He gestured at Patrick, encompassing his swollen hand, his broken nose, his split lip, his two black eyes. Reluctantly, Patrick conceded. “Come on,” Andrew said. “Let’s get you inside.”  
  
Pete and Andrew opened their doors and climbed out, and Pete helped Patrick out of the back seat. God, he just wanted to lie down. It was freshly, startlingly cold outside, and it had rained, neon lights dancing in the water puddled on the asphalt. Supporting Patrick with an arm around his shoulders, Andrew led him across the parking lot and inside.  
  
“Head down, now,” he muttered as the doors swung open, then said, more loudly, for the receptionist’s benefit, “Alright, buddy, we’re nearly there.”  
  
The receptionist looked up, and Patrick was careful to keep his face turned away from the little window to the office where she sat. Andrew tipped Patrick gently into a flimsy plastic chair to wait while he stepped up to the glass.  
  
“Excuse me, miss,” he said. Andrew had this way of talking when he was on the make, this low, smiling voice. “You got a room free? My buddy here had a few too many - he’s gettin’ married, poor bastard - and he needs to sleep it off before his mother in law sees him like this.”  
  
“Whatever you say, doll.” The receptionist stubbed out her cigarette in an overflowing ashtray, handed him a key and returned her attention to the magazine that lay open in front of her.  
  
“Much obliged,” said Andrew. Patrick would have bet good money that he was giving her the same melting smile that had persuaded Mrs. Gutierrez in the apartment downstairs to drop no fewer than six noise complaints against them. Andrew came back and tugged Patrick out of the chair, leading him across the small lobby and and down the hallway. It didn’t take a lot of acting on Patrick’s part - he leaned on Andrew, groaning faintly, and kept his head down.  
  
“Here we are,” Andrew murmured, eventually, stopping in front of a door with a large, yellow number seventeen painted on it. Pete caught them up a moment later, rounding the corner as Andrew unlocked the door.  
  
“She see you?” said Andrew, and Pete shook his head.  
  
“No, she was too busy with that magazine. Didn’t even look up, I walked right past her.”  
  
“Good.” Andrew pushed the door open and they all stepped inside, and Pete closed it again behind them. Unable to stand any longer, Patrick sat down on the end of the bed.  
  
“Alright,” Andrew said. “Patrick, you know what to do. If I’m not back in a week--” something passed over his face. “If I’m not back in a week, something’s gone wrong. Don’t hang around, just get out with whatever you can carry. Get as far away as you can.”  
  
Patrick nodded, just once. It wasn’t a nice thought, but it was always worth putting these things in place. Pete looked pale and scared. Patrick wanted to reach out and hold his hand, but he lost his nerve at the last moment.  
  
Andrew scrubbed one hand across his eyes. Patrick’s own eyes felt gritty and sore, and he’d slept in the car. Andrew had to be feeling awful. “Alright,” he said. “I’d better get going if I’m going to get back to New York tonight.”  
  
“Stay,” said Pete, suddenly. “You’ve been awake as long as I have, you shouldn’t be driving. You can go and see the Ways in the morning.”  
  
One corner of Andrew’s mouth tipped up in a familiar half-smile. “Thanks,” he said. “But I’ll be fine. I want to make sure I get to them before anyone else does. They should hear the good news from me.”  
  
Pete nodded, just once, and stuck out his hand. Andrew shook it, and turned to Patrick. It struck him, suddenly and with great force, what a risk Andrew was taking for them. If things went south with the Ways, Patrick would never see Andrew again, never know what had happened to him. He folded Andrew into a hug, holding him as tightly as he dared with his busted ribs. There were things he wanted to say, but he was feeling choked up and the words wouldn’t come. It didn’t matter. Andrew knew, he was sure of it. I love you, you son of a bitch, Patrick thought, burying his face in Andrew’s shoulder. You’d better come back alive.  
  
“One week,” said Andrew, stepping back. He ran a hand through his unwashed hair, sweeping it off his face. “I’ll come back. You two just sit tight.”  
  
He left, and Patrick locked the door behind him and turned to look at Pete. Now that they were alone together and the danger had passed, Patrick didn’t have the first idea what to say to him. So much had happened, that was the problem, and Patrick wasn’t sure where it left them. Pete had threatened to call the cops if Patrick ever set foot in his house again, but when Patrick had been left for dead at his door, he’d called a doctor instead. Had Pete forgiven him? _Could_ Pete forgive him?  
  
“Go to bed,” said Pete. If Patrick had been hoping for answers, he was disappointed. Pete just sounded tired. “You’re dead on your feet.”  
  
That, at least, Patrick couldn’t argue with. He took off his shoes and carefully peeled off his clothes. They were nicer than his own, but they didn’t quite fit - he’d had to borrow some from Pete after Andrew had taken his own ruined shirt and pants away to be destroyed. Slowly, gritting his teeth, he climbed into the bed. He was half expecting Pete to join him, but Pete just dug a paperback out of the only bag they’d brought with them and sat down at the flimsy little table in the corner instead.  
  
“Don’t you want--” Patrick hesitated. “I can move over, there’s room. If you want to sleep, I mean. I know you’re tired too.”  
  
It was so strange, he thought, how he’d shared Pete’s bed more than once and thought nothing of it, enjoyed the closeness. Now, with this rift between them, he felt vaguely ashamed even to have suggested it.  
  
“You sleep,” said Pete. “I’m not tired.”  
  
It was a lie and Patrick knew it, but he let it lie and climbed carefully into the bed, biting his tongue as he tried to prop himself up on the pillows. Pete got up and turned out the light, leaving the little lamp on the table on to read by. Patrick shut his eyes, and he was just about to drift off to sleep when Pete said, “Andrew’s a good guy.”  
  
It was so patently untrue that Patrick had to laugh, until his ribs began to hurt again and he had to stop. He pictured Andrew wiping his fingerprints off a gun with a rag soaked in gasoline, Andrew with a bloody nose and an unholy grin, Andrew with an inexpertly bandaged hand after he’d been caught skimming from the cash register and had his fingers forcibly introduced to a heavy door.  
  
“Alright, alright.” Pete was laughing too. “But you know what I mean. He’s a good guy to have on your side.”  
  
“Yeah,” said Patrick, opening his eyes. “Yeah, he’s a damn good friend to have. We look out for each other.” He saw Pete hesitate, and suddenly knew exactly what he was thinking. “Oh, no. Andrew likes the ladies.”  
  
Back when they’d first been living together - out of convenience, really - and Patrick hadn’t known how Andrew would feel about sharing his apartment with a dirty queer, he’d been careful. He’d snuck around and made up excuses and tried not to come home smelling like sex with visible beard burn. He’d even taken girls out, once or twice, to maintain the act. He’d thought he was doing a pretty good job, until he’d told Andrew he was going to the store and would be back later and Andrew had fixed him with a pitying look and said, “Patrick. I know about the boy.”  
  
Patrick had frozen, his hand halfway to the door handle and his heart in his mouth, ready to run, but Andrew had just winked and said, “If he tries to get to second base before you’re going steady, let me know and I’ll get the shotgun.”  
  
It had been an uncomfortable conversation, but in Patrick’s mind, that was the day when they’d truly become friends. One day, several years later, they’d even kissed. Andrew had been drunk and laughing in their living room - they both had - and Andrew had been leaning all over him and he’d kept on saying, “But how will I _know?_ Patrick, how will I know?” Eventually, Patrick had sighed, reeled him in by his tie and kissed him, deep and slow. After a minute, Andrew had pulled away, looking thoughtful. “Interesting,” he’d said. “But no.”  
  
It was possibly the shortest experimental phase anyone had ever had.  
  
“Where did you two meet?” Pete asked. “Prison?”  
  
Patrick smiled, remembering. “No. We were in a bar and he, uh, tried to steal my wallet. I nearly broke his arm.”  
  
“Of course you did.” Pete shook his head. He opened his book and settled himself more comfortably in his chair. “Get some sleep,” he said. “Goodnight, Patrick.”  
  
Patrick closed his eyes.

 

*

 

Patrick woke up a couple of hours later, gasping. He’d slid down so that he was on his back, and he couldn’t breathe. Pete was was still sitting up, reading. He looked over when he heard Patrick stirring, outlined in phosphorescent green and pink by the neon sign outside.  
  
“Hey,” he said, softly. “What’s the matter? Is it your ribs?”  
  
“Yeah,” said Patrick, tightly, trying not to breathe too deeply. The pain was awful, sick and hot around where the fractures were. It felt like being stabbed, like his lungs were being crushed smaller and smaller--he forced the panic back down, but Pete had noticed. He put the book down and came over, smoothing Patrick’s hair back off his clammy forehead.  
  
“Shh,” he murmured. “I’ve got you. Just breathe, can you do that for me?”  
  
Gently, he helped Patrick sit up a little straighter, propped up against all the pillows they’d been able to find. The pain didn’t ease up, but at least he could breathe again.  
  
“Thanks,” Patrick said, weakly.  
  
“Don’t mention it. There’s a machine out in the hallway, I’m going to go and get you some ice. Hang in there.”  
  
“No, Pete, you--come back here, I’m alright, you’re going to be _seen_ ,” hissed Patrick, but it was too late. Pete had already fetched a scratchy motel towel from the bathroom and disappeared into the dark hallway. Patrick lay there, trying to breathe. No one knew they were here, he reminded himself. There was no way they could have been found already. Pete would be back. A minute or two later, Pete reappeared with an armful of ice wrapped in the towel. He eased the door shut behind him, then crossed the dark room to the bed.  
  
“Thanks,” Patrick murmured, pathetically grateful, as Pete gently pressed the ice against his ribs. The cold was sweet relief, numbing the pain and easing the horrible throbbing.  
  
“It’s…” Pete looked down at his wrist, seemed to remember that he’d left his watch on the body in the car, swore, and looked up at the clock on the wall instead. “It’s almost three. You can take more morphine at five. You want me to wake you up?”  
  
“I’ll try to sleep through,” said Patrick. “Are you… you must be exhausted, are you sure you don’t want to sleep? I could take the couch if you don’t want--”  
  
“I’m fine.” It could have been the pain, or the dim light, but Patrick was almost sure he saw a tiny, tentative smile on Pete’s face. “You know I don’t sleep well, I don’t think I’m going to be able to tonight.”

 

*

 

When Patrick woke up again, the sun was filtering through the cheap drapes and filling the room with light. He’d slid back down the pillows again, and the pain in his ribs was fierce. Pete was still sitting at the table by the window, his chin propped on his hand. Patrick watched him for a moment, admiring the way the sun caught him and turned him to gold. He looked out of place in this cheap little room with its ugly wallpaper and its balding carpet. Standing in his own living room, surrounded by his books and his records, he’d looked like he belonged - and now, because of Patrick, he couldn’t go back.  
  
But he was alive.  
  
Patrick gritted his teeth and carefully levered himself into a more upright position. “Morning,” he croaked.  
  
Pete started. “Jesus,” he said, his voice hoarse after several long hours of silence. “Scared me half to death. How are you feeling?”  
  
Patrick grimaced. As he woke up, his brain was cataloguing the aches and pains that mapped his body. “I won’t lie,” he said. “I’ve been better. What about you? You haven’t been sitting there all night, have you? Did you sleep at all?”  
  
“Sure,” said Pete. He was lying, but Patrick didn’t dare call him on it. He was unshaven, with deep, dark shadows under his eyes. “It’s nearly eleven, you want that morphine now?”  
  
“Please.”  
  
Pete brought him a glass of water from the bathroom and helped him sit up so he could take the pills. He made as if to sit down at the end of the bed, then seemed to change his mind and took a seat on the couch instead. God, Patrick wished he knew what to say to him.  
  
“When did you know?” said Pete, after a minute.  
  
Patrick blinked. His head was still foggy. “What?” he said. He was expecting the rest of the question to be _when did you know you were gay?_ or possibly _when did you know you were in love with me?_ \- the answers to which were, respectively, _fifteen_ , and _that night when we went out dancing and you kissed me in the back of your car_.  
  
Pete said, “I mean, when did you know you couldn’t put a bullet in me and walk away?”  
  
Patrick sat up. “Huh,” he said. “There wasn’t… it happened slowly, I think.”  
  
Pete nodded, slowly, but didn’t speak. Patrick wondered if he should have lied.  
  
“Hey,” said Patrick, mainly to cut into the awful silence. “My turn. Can I ask you a question?”  
  
“Shoot.”  
  
Patrick looked at him suspiciously for a long moment, and then Pete’s poker face crumbled away to reveal a crooked grin. “That’s not funny, Pete.”  
  
He shrugged. “Agree to disagree. Ask away.”  
  
“Why did you wait so long? For-- with me, I mean. I thought I was being… pretty obvious. I wasn’t sure you were even interested.”  
  
Pete laughed, short and sharp. “Obvious? Christ, were you ever. Nearly gave me a goddamn heart attack. No, I just… liked you. I liked spending time with you. I wanted all that other stuff first. You know, dinner, dancing, the whole bit.”  
  
“We couldn’t figure it out,” said Patrick. The better he got to know Pete, the more ashamed he felt. Of course he and Andrew hadn’t known, but it was starting to look like they’d done just about the cruelest thing they could have done to Pete. “We thought you’d just want to fool around. We were kind of banking on it, actually.”  
  
Pete laughed again, but not at Patrick this time. “I figured out a long time ago that I’m… not much good at just fooling around,” he said. “It was always me who wanted more, every time. I was always the sucker who got his heart broken over something that was only supposed to be a bit of fun.”  
  
Patrick felt desperately sorry for him. Poor Pete, throwing his heart at everyone who came his way in the hopes that one day it might stick. “I can imagine,” he said.  
  
Pete shrugged. He was smiling, but he was smiling like he had to be in on the joke because the alternative was too much to bear. “I guess I’m a romantic. I figured that there had to be someone who’d stay, somewhere out there. If I just kept trying. And then I met you,” he said, quietly.  
  
Patrick wanted to tell him to stop; he didn’t want to hear this. He remembered how Pete had said the same thing the second time they’d met - _What can I say? I’m a romantic_ , like it was something he clung to. Patrick remembered how Pete had looked when he’d said, _Figures. I never fucking learn_. “You asked me if I had someone,” he said, suddenly, remembering something else. “Twice. You wanted to know whether I was serious about you.”  
  
Pete’s grin was brittle. “Guilty. Call it damage control. I didn’t want to get myself stuck on you only to find out you had a pretty wife and kids hidden away somewhere.”  
  
The more Patrick thought about it, the more sense it made and the sadder it made him. “You always wanted to take your time with me,” he said, softly. “I never - no one ever did that before.” It had always been _quick, before they find us here_ , or _quick, we only have this room for an hour_ , or, on one or two depressing occasions, _quick, before my wife gets home_.  
  
“Sure I did,” said Pete. Patrick didn’t know how Pete could look him in the eye and say these things like he wasn’t stripping himself bare. “You were… I don’t know, I felt like you were the start of something good.”  
  
Patrick laughed, short and bitter. “Yeah, look how that turned out.”  
  
“Oh, I don’t know,” said Pete. He smiled a careful little smile. “You still might be.”

 

*

 

“Pete,” said Patrick, wearily. “I’ll be fine. I can walk, for Christ’s sake, I’m not going far.”  
  
Pete didn’t look happy about it. “But--”  
  
“And it can’t be you,” Patrick went on, talking over him, “Because _you’re supposed to be dead._ ”  
  
“And so are you!”  
  
“Sure, but at least nobody knows what I look like.” They’d been having the same circular argument for half an hour. They needed to eat, and their empty stomachs weren’t improving their tempers. Pete still wasn’t sleeping and Patrick’s bruises had started to turn green around the edges, and cabin fever was beginning to set in. Patrick was worried about Pete. He barely moved from the couch, and he hadn’t shaved or showered since they’d arrived. The shadows under his eyes were dark and his chin was blue with stubble.  
  
“You could get us both killed,” Pete snapped. “What if they’re watching, huh? What if they’re just waiting for you to go out there? Did you think about that?”  
  
Patrick had thought about that. He wasn’t crazy about the idea of leaving Pete alone in the motel - what if there _was_ someone waiting to catch Pete on his own? But letting him leave the room would have been even more dangerous, and they’d need to eat sooner or later. “I did,” he said, “But Pete, come on, we need to eat. I know it’s not ideal, but it’s the only way. I’ll be _fine_.”  
  
“We’re kidding ourselves,” Pete muttered, rubbing his eyes. God, Patrick just wished he’d sleep. If Patrick had been in any fit state to do it, he would have thought seriously about knocking Pete unconscious for an hour or two. “We both know it, the only way out of here is feet first.”  
  
“Stop it,” said Patrick, forcing his temper down. “Listen, it could be days before Andrew gets back. And - look, I don’t know about you, but I didn’t pull that stunt back there just to starve to death in a motel in Atlantic City.”  
  
Pete didn’t say anything, but he had a stubborn look on his face that Patrick didn’t like.  
  
Patrick sighed. “I’ll be back in an hour or two,” he said. He hesitated, wondering whether had the nerve to press a kiss to Pete’s cheek. He decided that he didn’t, and then changed his mind. Hell, if something were to happen - and there was a very real chance that it might - he wanted to go with no regrets. Quickly, before he could talk himself out of it, he leaned in, but Pete had moved at just the wrong moment and Patrick’s lips grazed the corner of his mouth instead, and they both jumped like they’d been shocked. Patrick felt hyper-aware of the place where his skin had touched Pete’s. He felt like he was burning. He wondered whether Pete was burning too. Pete touched two fingers to his mouth, looking as surprised as he might have done if Patrick had hit him, and Patrick’s chest felt tight. Before he could do anything else he might regret, he took his hat and coat from the coat stand, unlocked the door and stepped out into the hallway.  
  
Outside, the day was cool, with patches of watery sunlight breaking through the sullen clouds. The seasons hadn’t turned yet and Atlantic City still looked gray and sad, in the way of all beach towns in the winter. It was too early in the year for tourists, and the streets were quiet. Patrick’s ribs felt tight and painful and he could feel every breath pushing against them, but he walked as fast as he could, keeping his head down and his hat tipped forward to hide his face. He didn’t know where he was going, but he had a few dollars in his pocket and he figured that if he kept walking he’d come across a deli or a convenience store or something, anywhere that would sell him something to eat. There was a newsstand up ahead, and he hadn’t been planning to stop, but then something caught his eye. Patrick could hear his heart beating in his ears as he moved closer.  
  
_Prominent New York Tycoon Peter Wentz III Found Dead In New Jersey_ , announced the headline. Unable to look away, he scanned the first paragraph. _Responding to a call from a concerned citizen in the small hours of Friday morning, police and fire crews attended a gruesome scene off Highway 495. With the blaze safely extinguished, police removed two sets of human remains from Mr. Wentz’s Cadillac Eldorado, and as of this morning, the coroner’s office have confirmed that the remains belong to Mr. Peter Wentz III, 36, and Mr. Patrick Stump, 30. As per a statement from the chief of police, the incident is the subject of an ongoing investigation and the cause is, as yet, unknown. For more details, turn to page seven.  
  
_ Patrick read it and re-read it a couple more times, trying to make sense of it all. Andrew’s friend in the coroner’s office had come through for them, that was the most important thing. But what about the police investigation? If it got out that the police suspected foul play, the Ways wouldn’t be happy. Hell, maybe if they dug deep enough, if they tracked down Andrew’s buddy and leaned on him hard enough he might admit to falsifying the death certificates, and _then_ \--  
  
“Hey, pal, you gonna buy something or just stand there staring all day?”  
  
Patrick jumped. “No,” he mumbled. “Sorry, I was just, uh…” ignoring the guy’s irritated noise, he turned and hurried away, his heart still pounding.

 

*

 

Patrick unlocked the motel room door and shouldered it open, trying not to drop any of the paper bags in his arms.  
  
“Pete?” he called, looking around.  
  
Pete stepped slowly out of the bathroom, his eyes wide and scared. He had a white-knuckled grip on the switchblade Andrew had insisted that he keep, but when he saw Patrick he let out a sigh of relief and dropped the knife with a clatter.  
  
“Thank _Christ_ ,” he said, striding across the room as if he was going to throw his arms around Patrick but stopping short before he could touch him. He’d showered, Patrick noticed. He looked freshly-scrubbed and clean-shaven, like he’d made an effort to shake off his bad mood. “I was climbing the walls, I couldn’t stop thinking about what might have happened to you out there.”  
  
“Yeah,” said Patrick. “You and me both.” He picked up one of the bags and peered in, trying to remember which one had the sandwiches in it. He found it on the second try and handed it to Pete, who tore open the greasy paper with an indecent moan of pleasure. Patrick sat down on the bed and took a bite of the other sandwich, chewing and swallowing without really tasting it. They ate in silence for a while, side by side on the end of the bed, hunger superseding conversation. The quiet was comfortable, almost like the way it had been before.  
  
“I’m sorry,” said Pete, suddenly. Patrick started guiltily. He’d been watching Pete lick mustard off his fingers.  
  
“Sorry?” he repeated. “What for?”  
  
“I know I’ve been…” Pete made a face and started again. He was folding and re-folding the sandwich wrapper into smaller and smaller squares, looking down at his hands. “I’m not well. I guess you probably knew that. It’s, uh. Manic depression. I’ve got pills to take. I deal better than I used to, but there are days when I wake up and I think nothing’s ever going to be good again.” He looked up at Patrick with a brittle smile. “I’ve been reliably informed that it makes me act like a real jerk sometimes.”  
  
Patrick didn’t think, just wrapped one arm around Pete’s shoulders and pulled him close, ignoring the sharp pain in his ribs. Pete sagged against his side and let out a long, slow breath. It felt familiar and strange all at once. “That’s a hell of a raw deal,” Patrick said. Pete huffed out a dry, mirthless laugh.  
  
“Yeah. You’ve probably noticed, I’ve been… and I was going crazy in here while you were gone, I just kept thinking - what if you didn’t come back, you know? What if the last thing I ever said to you was that you were going to get us killed? I was just scared, I didn’t mean it.”  
  
Patrick squeezed Pete’s arm, enjoying the closeness. He’d missed it, he realized. He’d been starving. “I know you didn’t,” he said. “You weren’t a jerk. This is… it’d be rough on anyone.”  
  
Neither of them said anything for a long moment. Then Pete said, quietly, “I’m… there are good days and bad days. I’m not always easy to live with. And there’s--well, you were there. You know about the nightmares. I thought you should know about this too. Thought I’d save you the buyer’s remorse.”  
  
Patrick pulled Pete closer and sighed. He wondered who had made Pete believe he was so unloveable. Patrick looked down at him and raised an eyebrow. “You having second thoughts?”  
  
“No,” said Pete, immediately. “No, I just thought maybe _you_ \--”  
  
“Pete,” said Patrick. “I’m a crook and a killer, I’m not much of a catch. You wanna talk about moral high ground? I’m six feet under. Have been for years. If you were getting cold feet, I’d understand.”  
  
Pete laughed. “Yeah,” he said. “Yeah, alright.” He sat back and looked thoughtfully at Patrick, idly taking Patrick’s uninjured hand in his. “I can’t imagine it. Isn’t that strange? I watched you put a knife in a man’s chest like it was nothing and I still can’t see it.”  
  
“Not really. We weren’t always--” Patrick stopped, frustrated, and sighed. “This is coming out all wrong. I’m not trying to… to make excuses or justify what we did. I just want you to know it wasn’t always like that. We had a normal life, most of the time. We fought about who’d left dishes in the sink. We had a cat. We got drunk and played our music too loud and pissed off the neighbors. A few years ago there was a summer when we both had jobs - real jobs, I was a waiter and he was a bellhop - and we went straight for a while.” It hadn’t been the first time, or the last. Jobs ended, money ran out, and they’d never managed to make it stick.  
  
“I get it,” said Pete. “Well, no, of course I don’t. But you did what you had to do, I get _that_.”  
  
Patrick wasn’t so sure he did. Andrew had been left on the orphanage’s doorstep as an infant in 1926 and Patrick had been born to blue collar parents in a shabby suburb of Chicago just two years later in 1928; they were children of the great depression. Their current circumstances were unusual, granted, but they’d both grown up hungry and it had warped what they thought of as _doing what they had to_ like the damp warps floorboards. Patrick didn’t blame him for it, but Pete, cushioned by his family’s money, would never understand.  
  
Patrick wasn’t going to pick a fight over it. There was no point. Tentatively, he reached out and ran one hand through Pete’s hair. It was still damp, but it was already drying in half-formed curls. “Your hair looks different without all that pomade,” he said.  
  
Pete smiled, but there was an edge to it, like he was bracing himself for something. “Yeah,” he said. “It would. You know my mom was black, right?”  
  
Patrick blinked. “Huh. No, I didn’t.” Suddenly curious, he said, “You got a picture of her?”  
  
“Matter of fact, I do,” said Pete, getting to his feet. “It’s in my--” his face fell, and he sat back down. “I _did_. It was in the handle of my gun. You know, one of those sweetheart grips? With a photograph underneath the plastic. We used to make them out of the windows of planes that had gone down, we had enough time on our hands. Most of the guys I served with had photos of their girls in theirs. They gave me shit for it, called me a mommy’s boy.” he shrugged. “I don’t know. It was like she was watching over me.”  
  
“Oh, Pete,” said Patrick. “You should’ve said, we wouldn’t have made you leave it behind in the car--”  
  
“Forget it,” said Pete. “I came home from France in one piece and she’s still alive.” He was quiet for a moment, then he squeezed Patrick’s hand and said, quietly, “It’s… most people don’t know. It’s not something I talk about much.”  
  
Pete picked up the orange tin of Murray’s Superior Hairdressing Pomade from the nightstand and handed it to Patrick. The two faces on the top had hair like Pete’s. “I’m not ashamed, or anything,” he said, more defiantly, as he watched Patrick turn the tin over in his hands. “It’s just easier, sometimes. You know, to let people think what they think.”  
  
Patrick handed the tin back and smiled at him. “Well, I like it. It suits you.”  
  
Pete smiled back, cautious, almost shy. “Hey,” he said, suddenly. “We never talked about where we’re going to go when Andrew comes back with the money.”  
  
Patrick blinked “Huh,” he said, caught off guard by the sudden change of subject. “No, we never did.” Somehow, in the rush to get out of New York, he’d forgotten. It had seemed so toweringly unlikely that they’d get away with it that he supposed he just hadn’t thought that far ahead.  
  
Pete grinned. “Ladies’ choice,” he said. “Where in the world would you go? Think big, now.”  
  
“Don’t make me choose!” protested Patrick. “This seems like an awfully big decision to be making on a whim, don’t you think?”  
  
“Not a whim,” said Pete. He was bright-eyed, more animated than Patrick had seen him in days. Patrick would have followed him anywhere, just then. “ _Fate_ , Patrick.”  
  
Patrick laughed, hopelessly charmed. “I don’t know! Mexico?”  
  
“Patrick, if you think I’m taking your lily-white ass to Mexico you’re sorely mistaken. You’d burn to a crisp, you’d hate it.”  
  
“Maybe,” Patrick conceded. “Alright, then, Canada.”  
  
“ _Canada?_ You’re not thinking big enough, doll. The whole, wide world at your feet and you pick _Canada?_ ”  
  
“Oh, I see how it is. What happened to fate, huh?” Patrick was laughing, and it was a moment before he noticed the thoughtful expression on Pete’s face. “Oh no. I know that look.”  
  
“You might have something there,” said Pete.  
  
“I--what, Canada? Really?”  
  
“God, no, don’t be ridiculous.” Pete bumped his shoulder against Patrick’s. “But you’ve got me thinking. How’s your French?”  
  
“How’s my…” it took Patrick a second or two to catch on. “Hold on. _France?_ ”  
  
“Why not? Beautiful country, fantastic food. We’ll get a little place out in the countryside where no one knows who we are.” Pete grinned, and it was like watching the sun rise. “What do you say?”

 

*

 

Patrick hadn’t had to walk far to find food, but it had worn him out. He’d taken more Novocaine and Pete had helped him ice his ribs and his hand again, and by eight o’clock he could barely keep his eyes open. Pete returned from the bathroom, where he’d been noisily emptying the rapidly melting ice wrapped in the thin, damp towel into the bathtub, to find Patrick half asleep. Pete smoothed Patrick’s hair back from his face, his hands still cold from the ice, and Patrick hummed and leaned into the touch.  
  
“Hey,” said Pete. His voice was soft and unsure, and Patrick opened one eye. “I’m pretty beat, too. You mind if I join you?”  
  
It was silly, really, that something so small could make Patrick’s heart feel so dangerously full. “Yeah,” he whispered. “Yeah, please. Come here.”  
  
Pete’s smile was small and tentative, and Patrick could feel it pulling at him like the tide as he carefully shuffled his way towards the edge of the lumpy mattress, making room. Pete turned out the light and pulled back the covers, climbing in next to Patrick. They weren’t close enough to touch, but Patrick could feel the warmth coming off his skin. Pete lay still, almost humming with tension. After a minute, he said, in a voice so small Patrick could barely hear him, “Sing me something.”  
  
“I--yeah, alright,” Patrick said, surprised but pleased. If only he didn’t suddenly have a head full of love songs. And Mack The Knife, for some reason, which hardly seemed appropriate. Something else, he thought. Anything else at all. “I hear the train a-comin’,” he sang, softly, feeling his ribs protest with every breath he took. “It’s rollin’ round the bend, and I ain’t seen the sunshine since I don’t know when. I’m stuck in Folsom prison, and time keeps draggin’ on…”  
  
Next to him, Pete started to laugh. “ _Really?_ ” he said.  
  
“Well, I don’t know, you rushed me!” Patrick was laughing too, or he would have been if he could have done it without it hurting. “You should have made a request.”  
  
“I didn’t know that was on the table,” said Pete. “You’re like my own personal jukebox. Give me something sweet.”  
  
“Alright, alright, something sweet.” Patrick thought for a minute, and then it came to him. It seemed like a big, brave thing to have picked, but it felt right. It felt like the kind of thing Pete would have chosen. “I keep a close watch on this heart of mine,” he sang, his voice barely a whisper. “I keep my eyes wide open all the time. I keep the ends out for the tie that binds. Because you’re mine, I walk the line.” He hesitated.  
  
“Keep going,” murmured Pete, after a long moment.  
  
Encouraged, Patrick went on, “I find it very, very easy to be true. I find myself alone when each day is through.” He took a deep, painful breath. “Yes, I’ll admit that I’m a fool for you. Because you’re mine, I walk the line.”  
  
As he sang, he felt Pete relaxing by degrees. Little by little, his breathing turned slow and even. When the song was almost over, Patrick paused, listening, trying to work out whether Pete was still awake.  
  
“C’mon,” Pete mumbled, sleepily. “You know the rest, don’t make me sing it. Because you’re mine…”  
  
“I walk the line,” Patrick finished, softly.  
  
He looked over, and Pete was finally asleep.

 

*

 

On the fourth day, Patrick woke up with a violent start, slammed back into his body and gasping for breath. It took him a moment to realize what had woken him, but when he did, it made his blood run cold.  
  
Someone was outside, banging on the door.  
  
Next to him, Pete lay very still, barely breathing, his eyes wide.  
  
“I’ve got it,” Patrick murmured. “You stay here.”  
  
He grimaced and levered himself upright, feeling the sick, familiar pain in his ribs. He needed more Novocaine, but it would have to wait. Judging by the bright sunlight filtering in through the cheap drapes, it was almost noon. As he walked over to the door, he felt strangely unafraid. If it was--well, if the worst had happened and they’d been found and Andrew wasn’t coming for them, there wasn’t a whole lot he could do about it in this state.  
  
He took a deep breath, and opened the door.  
  
“It’s about time, you lazy bastards,” said Andrew, grinning, and Patrick thought his heart was going to burst. He pulled Andrew in for a hug, ignoring his protesting ribs.  
  
“Oh, thank god,” he said, indistinctly. He felt almost dizzy with relief. “Christ, it’s so good to see you.” He took a step back and looked Andrew up and down, hardly daring to believe it. But there he was, unscathed, large as life, a suitcase in his hand. “Are you alright? How did it go, did the Ways buy it?”  
  
“Honestly?” Andrew stepped inside and closed the door behind him. “I don’t know. Those two give me the fucking creeps. How the hell are you supposed to know what they’re thinking? I’m glad you two are alright.” He lifted the suitcase up onto the table and flipped the lid open. “Here’s your share,” he said. “Thirty-five grand. That should tide you over until you get settled and someone can start wiring Pete’s money over.”  
  
Patrick looked up at him. “Thirty-five?”  
  
Andrew pulled an envelope from inside his jacket and handed it to Patrick. “Thirty-five, less what it cost me to get passports made up for you both. False names, don’t worry.”  
  
“Thanks, Andy. But - thirty five? The Ways were only offering fifty.”  
  
“Yeah,” said Andrew, grimly. “They were very grateful that I’d taken care of you as well.” He closed the lid of the suitcase and pushed it towards Patrick. “Come on. Let’s hit the road.”  
  
They’d packed lightly when they’d left Pete’s house four days ago - a change of clothes each, a couple of Pete’s books - and it didn’t take them long to gather up everything that had ended up scattered around the room.  
  
“I won’t be sorry to see the back of this place,” muttered Pete, and Patrick chuckled.  
  
“Me neither. I’ve been seeing that damn wallpaper every time I close my eyes.”  
  
“I’ve paid your bill,” said Andrew. “We’ll go out through the parking lot. Different receptionist, but I’d prefer it if she didn’t see you. Can’t be too careful.” He held the door for Patrick and Pete closed it again behind them. Andrew led them down the hallway, towards the back door to the parking lot.  
  
“Have you heard anything?” Patrick asked, as they walked. “Are the cops sniffing around?”  
  
“Not a word,” said Andrew. “If they are, they’re doing it damn quietly. Speaking of filthy animals sniffing around, Princess sends her love.”  
  
An odd pang of sadness went through Patrick. She was an awful creature, but he’d miss her.  
  
“Oh, I brought you a pair of cheaters to cover up the horror show,” Andrew said, as they stepped out into the spring sunshine. He handed Patrick a pair of dark glasses.  
  
“Thanks.” Patrick took them and put them on. They wouldn’t hide the broken nose, but at least they’d cover the shiners. Andrew led them over to an unfamiliar car, and Pete helped Patrick into the back seat. Patrick glanced at his reflection in the rear view mirror and winced. It wasn’t much of an improvement. Andrew, who had been watching, raised his eyebrows behind his own sunglasses. “That’s what you get for messing with Frank Iero, doll.”  
  
“I didn’t,” said Patrick, scowling and pulling his hat down over his face. “Frank Iero messed with me.”  
  
“You _survived_ Frank Iero,” said Andrew, reasonably, as he hit the gas and pulled out of the parking lot. “And you’ve still got both kneecaps. That’s pretty good going.”  
  
“Jesus,” muttered Pete. “I just wanted to pick up the cute pianist from the bar.”  
  
“Ha,” said Patrick. “I bet you’re sorry that you tried.”  
  
Pete raised an eyebrow. “Oh, I don’t know,” he said, and he smiled. “I’ve done worse things.”

 

*

 

“I’m taking you to New York Harbor,” said Andrew, once they were out of Atlantic City and speeding up the Parkway to New York. “You decided where you’re going yet?”  
  
“France,” said Pete, and Andrew nodded.  
  
“Good. You can pick up a cruise liner to… St. Pierre?”  
  
“St. Pierre, yeah.”  
  
Patrick sat in the back seat, chewing nervously on his lip. The cut opened up again, and he stopped. It was beginning to sink in that they were doing it, they were leaving - and that they’d be leaving New York and Andrew behind. Patrick tried to imagine a life without him and drew a blank. It was like trying to imagine cutting off his right arm. “Hey,” he said, quietly, leaning forwards in his seat, unable to shake the impulse off. “You want to come with us?”  
  
Andrew hesitated, and Patrick watched in the rear view mirror as something unreadable passed across his face. “No, I think I’ll stay,” he said, eventually. He grinned, looking almost like his old self. “You know what they say, three’s a crowd. I think I’ll head out on my own, I wouldn’t want to get in the way of you two lovebirds.”  
  
“You wouldn’t be,” said Patrick. He looked over at Pete, realizing too late that he should have thought to ask him sooner. Patrick wasn’t used to taking other people into account. It had been just him and Andrew for so long that he supposed he was out of practice. “Is that… you wouldn’t mind?”  
  
Pete reached over and took Patrick’s uninjured hand in his, and smiled. “Not at all,” he said. “We’d be happy to have you. Anyway, you’re the one who’s getting us out of here.”  
  
Andrew glanced up at the mirror. “Thanks, but I think I’d better stick around,” he said. “It’s going to look pretty shady if the cops come calling and I’ve upped and left too. But maybe I’ll come and visit.”

 

*

 

The sun was high and bright as they stood on the busy docks, saying their goodbyes. Patrick had kept the dark glasses on, and Pete’s hat was pulled down low to hide his face.  
  
Pete took Andrew’s hand and shook it. “Thank you,” he said, sincerely. “I know you really stuck your neck out for us back there, we won’t forget it. You’re welcome to come and visit as soon as we’ve found a place. Call it an open invitation.” He tucked a folded slip of paper into Andy’s pocket. “You’ll need this. It’s my friend Gabe’s address, he’s going to be running things for me. If you want to write, send your letters to him and he’ll pass them on as soon as he knows where we’re living.”  
  
Andrew looked taken aback, but pleased. “I will,” he said, patting his pocket. “That’s, uh. Swell of you. Thanks.”  
  
“No sweat. If you ever get into any trouble and you need a favor, he’s your man.”  
  
Andrew grinned. “Trouble? Me? I’ll have you know I’m a law abiding citizen, sir.”  
  
Patrick rolled his eyes. “Hey,” he said, reaching out and catching Andrew by the arm. “We needed you for this. We couldn’t have done it without you, Andy, I don’t know how to thank you.”  
  
Andrew was still smiling, but it no longer reached his eyes. “You know me,” he said. “Your girl Friday.”  
  
Patrick’s answering smile felt shaky, too. God, he was going to miss him. “Promise me you’ll take care of yourself,” he said, softly, not letting go of Andrew’s arm. “Promise me you won’t do anything stupid.”  
  
“Oh yeah, wise guy? Like what?”  
  
“Don’t get smart with me, Andy, I know you. Just… keep your head down, alright?” He couldn’t bring himself to say it out loud, but the thought that Andrew might find his way back to Boston and the mob kept gnawing at him. He still remembered the Andrew he’d met all those years ago, gaunt and frightened and angry all the time.  
  
“I’ll be fine,” said Andrew. “Think I’ll make my way back out west. See LA, enjoy the sunshine. I won’t go looking for trouble.”  
  
“That’s what I’m worried about,” said Patrick, but he felt a little bit better. “Keep in touch, alright? I mean it.”  
  
“I’ll write,” Andrew promised. He picked up his bag, but his shoulders were tight and his mouth was pressed into an unhappy line. “So long, kid. Don’t be a stranger.”  
  
“For heaven’s _sake_ ,” said Patrick, fondly, and pulled him in for a hug. “Tell me you’ll miss me, you idiot.”  
  
“You know I will,” said Andrew, and his voice in Patrick’s ear was choked. “You’ll write too?”  
  
“Just you try to stop me.”  
  
Andrew pulled back, laughing. “Go on, get gone,” he said. His eyes were bright. “You’re going to miss the boat.”

 

*  
July 7th, 1959

 

Patrick drummed his fingers idly against his thigh while his thoughts spun like a fairground cotton candy machine. What if one of their letters had gone astray? What if he’d changed his mind? What if--  
  
“Hey,” said Pete, reaching out and putting his hand on top of Patrick’s. “He’ll be here.”  
  
Patrick grinned, guiltily. “I know,” he said. “I know, I just… worry.”  
  
Today was the day Andrew was due to arrive. Patrick had been asking him to come and stay for months, not fooled by the breezy postcards Andrew had been sending him for the past year and change. But the last one had said, simply, _You win. I’m coming home.  
  
_ Pete hit the gas and the car roared through the countryside. It had been dark when they’d stumbled out of bed, yawning and stretching, the world still and star-strewn and velvety outside - it was a long drive up to Saint-Malo, and they’d had to get up early. They’d driven through a sunrise that eventually gave way to a beautiful morning, sunkissed and luminous, crowned with an endless blue sky. Pete had bought himself a replacement for the Cadillac that they’d wrecked, something even bigger and flashier (completely ignoring Patrick’s protests that they were supposed to be keeping a low profile) but it only had two seats, so they’d taken the Jeep instead. The Jeep - ancient, mud-caked and rust-encrusted - had come with the place Pete had bought, a one-time farmhouse several miles away from the nearest village, itself a good hour’s drive outside Bordeaux. Fired with enthusiasm, Pete had announced that he was going to fix the Jeep up and get it running again. He’d spent ten minutes just trying to open the hood before looking down at the engine with an expression of profound consternation, muttering, “Well, Jesus, _I_ don’t know what it’s supposed to look like,” and calling a mechanic.  
  
Things weren’t so bad, Patrick thought, looking over at Pete with a smile. Things weren’t so bad at all. It was high summer, and Pete’s skin had turned a deep, warm brown everywhere the sun had touched him. Patrick watched him for a moment - one hand on the wheel, the other arm resting casually on the edge of the open window, sleeves rolled up and collar unbuttoned - and marveled, quietly, at the shape of his own life. When they’d woken up together on their first morning in the house, the sunlight streaming in, Patrick had kissed Pete’s temple and whispered, “So how does it feel to be a dead man, huh?” and Pete had grinned. “Pretty damn swell,” he’d said. “But I think I went to heaven.” They’d settled into something of a routine, staying up late and drinking wine and redecorating the tumbledown old place, the weeks and months piling up behind them. The house, chosen by Pete in a fit of romantic enthusiasm, had been what Pete called _a fixer-upper_ and Patrick called _a wreck, Pete, good god, what were you thinking._ With the help of a brigade of builders and tradesmen, they’d spent the first summer making it fit to live in. For Patrick, it had been an education in just how quickly you could get things done if you had money to throw around.  
  
Pete hadn’t lied, though, there were bad days and bad dreams too. Patrick had driven himself crazy trying to fix things for him. It had taken months, but eventually, he’d figured out that the best thing he could do was keep Pete company as he weathered the storms. He’d told Patrick that it was incurable, what he had, and perhaps that was true, but Patrick had decided that he was damned if he couldn’t at least make it a little easier to bear.

 

*

 

The docks at Saint-Malo were crowded with people, moving in all directions.  
  
“Jesus,” said Patrick, dismayed, as the Jeep ground to a halt. “We’ll never find him in all this.”  
  
“Hey.” Pete squeezed Patrick’s hand. “We’ll find him. Come on, let’s go find someone to ask.”  
  
They left the car and pushed through the crowd until they found a harried-looking officer, and Patrick searched the flow of people walking by for familiar faces while Pete asked questions. His French was hateful, mainly profanities and assorted military vocabulary he’d acquired during the war, but it was still better than Patrick’s.  
  
“Alright,” said Pete, turning back to Patrick. “According to my friend here, the last ferry from St. Pierre came in half an hour ago. So long as the boat from New York got in on time, he should be here.”  
  
Patrick looked around, helplessly. “But _where?_ I knew there’d be something--”  
  
“Hey.” Pete cut him off before his panic could sink its roots in. Patrick wished, desperately, that he could just take Pete’s hand, hold onto him like an anchor in a storm. Instead, he stuck his hands into his pockets, flexing his fingers. He remembered what it felt like, that would have to be enough. The laws were different in France, but he wasn’t stupid. “Relax,” said Pete. “He’s a sharp one. He kept himself out of prison for years before he met you, didn’t he?”  
  
“Mostly out of prison,” Patrick conceded. “You’re right, I’m sure he’s fine. So where do the ferries dock?”  
  
“Ah,” said Pete. “Good question. Let’s find out. Hey, _monsieur, excusez-moi--_ ”  
  
Patrick waited, shifting his weight from one foot to the other while the officer gave Pete directions. They’d made a couple of stops along the way, but it was good to get out of the car and stretch his legs, feel the sun on his face.  
  
“This way,” said Pete. “I think.”  
  
Patrick was impressed. “You understood all that?”  
  
“No,” Pete admitted. “He pointed. Come on, let’s go.”  
  
They started walking, Pete doing his best to read the signs while Patrick searched the crowd.  
  
“Over there!” said Pete, after a minute or two, and Patrick’s heart leapt. He pointed. “Look, I can see it.”  
  
“Oh,” said Patrick, trying hard not to feel disappointed. “Yeah, of course. Well spotted.” Pete was right, the ferry had docked, but they were already pulling up the gangplank. He isn’t here, Patrick thought. He’s changed his mind, or the police have finally caught up with him, or--  
  
A familiar figure caught Patrick’s eye. He was skinnier than ever, his face hidden behind a pair of dark glasses, but Patrick would have known the set of his shoulders anywhere. “There,” he said, suddenly, his heart skipping. “He’s over there, I can see him. Come on!”  
  
He half-ran towards Andrew. As he got closer, Patrick could see that he’d been drinking too much and not eating enough. He looked thin and wrung-out, somehow older than he’d been, and he’d grown a beard, and Patrick had missed him so much he ached with it.  
  
“The _beard_ , Andy, what possessed you?” he said, in a slightly choked voice, his face buried in Andrew’s shoulder.  
  
Andrew laughed, holding Patrick like he thought he might try to get away. “I missed you too,” he said, and Patrick made a muffled noise of agreement. After a long, long moment, he forced himself to let go. Andrew pushed his sunglasses up to the top of his head, and Patrick noticed the deep, dark shadows under his eyes.  
  
“Jesus,” he said. “How many days has it been since you slept?”  
  
“I’ve been on a boat,” said Andrew, as Pete stepped forward to shake his hand. “Good to see you, too, Pete. I _hate_ boats.”  
  
Patrick laughed as he picked up Andrew’s suitcase and started to thread his way back through the crowd. “Pathetic,” he said, grinning and bumping his shoulder against Andrew’s. “You big baby, it’s just a boat.”  
  
“Yeah, well, it turns out I get seasick,” said Andrew, darkly, and Pete laughed.  
  
“You should’ve seen me when I shipped out to fight,” he said. “I lost my lunch before we’d even left the harbor. Come on, the car’s this way.”  
  
They led Andrew back to where they’d parked the Jeep. “Here she is,” said Pete, and walked around to put Andrew’s suitcase in the trunk.  
  
Andrew looked back at Patrick and hesitated, still holding the door handle. “Are you sure you don’t mind me staying?” he said, quietly. “It’s alright, I know you’ve got a whole life here now. You don’t have to--”  
  
Patrick squeezed Andrew’s shoulder, feeling the bone through his shirt and his jacket. “As if we’d let you leave,” he said. “Get in the car, Andrew.”  
  
Andrew smiled back, tentatively. “Alright,” he said. “Alright.”  
  
He climbed into the backseat and Patrick hopped into the passenger side. “It’s a long drive back home,” said Patrick, turning around in his seat to look at Andrew. “You might as well get some sleep.”  
  
“In this rustbucket?” said Andrew. “As if. What’s the matter, Wentz, can’t keep your man in the style to which he’s become accustomed?”  
  
The engine turned over and Pete laughed. “I bought a new Cadillac, actually. You gonna set that one on fire for me too?”  
  
Andrew closed his eyes and leant back in his seat, still smiling. “Maybe,” he said. Patrick watched as his breathing turned slow and even. He was in bad shape, half feral and half a ghost, there was no denying that, but he’d come home.  
  
“Happy?” said Pete, as they left Saint-Malo and set out on the long drive home.  
  
Patrick looked back over his shoulder at Andrew, already fast asleep in the backseat, the sunlight falling on his face and his head lolling on his shoulders, and then at Pete, turned to gold in the light. “Yeah,” Patrick murmured, reaching for Pete’s hand. “Happy.”

**Author's Note:**

> It might interest and appall some of you to know that all of the recipes mentioned in this story really existed. In order of appearance, [Perfection Salad](https://vintagerecipecards.files.wordpress.com/2011/05/perfection_salad.jpg), [Frosted Cream Cheese Ribbon Loaf](https://cdn-jpg2.thedailymeal.com/sites/default/files/styles/tdm_slideshow_large/public/slides/3--Frosted-Ribbon-Loaf-Amy-Buthod.jpg?itok=WKI_n5h3), [Ham and Bananas Hollandaise](http://del.h-cdn.co/assets/17/30/ham-and-bananas-2.jpg), [Tuna Jell-o Pie](https://i.kinja-img.com/gawker-media/image/upload/s--QGatVMzL--/c_scale,fl_progressive,q_80,w_800/19fe7vp7tkx7cjpg.jpg), [Frosted Lime and Walnut Salad](https://www.drivingfordeco.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/03/Lime-Walnut-Salad.jpg). Likewise, [Murder Inc.](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Murder,_Inc.) was a real organisation run by Albert Anastasia until it was exposed by a former member in the early 1940s, and Anastasia was gunned down in the barber shop at the Park Sheraton Hotel in Manhattan in October 1957. Sweetheart grips on WWII military issue Colt M1911 pistols were real, too, and there's an interesting page about them [here](https://www.thevintagenews.com/2016/09/02/sweetheart-grips-wwii-soldiers-known-take-precious-family-photos-put-clear-grips-pistols-2-2/).


End file.
